Archive for November, 2009
Climate change data DUMPED
The Sunday Times, November 29, 2009
SCIENTISTS at the University of East Anglia (UEA) have admitted throwing away much of the raw temperature data on which their predictions of global warming are based.
It means that other academics are not able to check basic calculations said to show a long-term rise in temperature over the past 150 years.
The UEA’s Climatic Research Unit (CRU) was forced to reveal the loss following requests for the data under Freedom of Information legislation.
The data were gathered from weather stations around the world and then adjusted to take account of variables in the way they were collected. The revised figures were kept, but the originals — stored on paper and magnetic tape — were dumped to save space when the CRU moved to a new building.
The admission follows the leaking of a thousand private emails sent and received by Professor Phil Jones, the CRU’s director. In them he discusses thwarting climate sceptics seeking access to such data.
Read more at http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6936328.ece
Al Gore’s “Inconvenient Truth” is now seen to be a very convenient lie . . . for him!!
Read “Al Gore could become world’s first carbon billionaire” at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/energy/6491195/Al-Gore-could-become-worlds-first-carbon-billionaire.html
Make a difference, Become a pollworker
Make a difference in Milwaukee County.
The Republican Party of Milwaukee County, by State statute, gets to nominate people who want to be pollworkers in their own municipalities in Milwaukee County.
Volunteer to become a Republican Pollworker:
Be on the front line of fighting vote fraud at the polling place.
This is a paid position, you are an employee of your municipality.
You are trained by your municipal clerk.
Besides working on election day you also may be offered additional time prior to the election.
We need you to respond by November 28, so that we can then appoint you to your municipality by November 30.
Being a Republican pollworker in your municipality is an excellent way to help prevent election fraud while getting paid for it at the same time. If you are interested in being a (paid) pollworker, please contact the Republican Party of Milwaukee County at 414-727-1220.
Volunteer to become an Election Observer:
Become the “eyes and ears” of the Republican Party.
We will arm you with the tools you will need to become an effective observer.
Your presence at the polls will let “would be violators” know that “we are watching”.
We want you to volunteer for the February primary or the April election so that you are an experienced observer for the all important fall elections.
Contact the Republican Party of Milwaukee County at 414-727-1220.
For more info, go to http://milwaukee.wisgop.info/volunteer/
The Art of Political War for Tea Parties
by David Horowitz, Front Page Mag, November 26, 2009
A specter is haunting America – the specter of a people rising. All across the nation Americans are waking up to the threat of a leftist elite determined to fundamentally change America, push through a socialist agenda, and make every citizen dependent on the state. The Obama machine is spending trillions of tax-payer dollars to finance their takeover of the American workplace and stifle the independence of the American people. But America is resilient nation, built on the principles of private property and individual freedom, and the resistance to their socialist plans has already begun.
In May 2009, just five months into the Obama administration, the people of California launched a tax revolt in the biggest spending state in the nation. So reckless were the leftist Democrats who run California (and have done so for as long as anyone can remember) that its deficit alone was larger than the budgets of most other states in the Union and of many of the nations of the world. Leftwing politicians don’t cut budgets; they propose new taxes. And California’s leftwing legislature did just that. But thanks to a constitutional amendment put in place by the California electorate through the state Initiative process, California legislators can’t raise taxes without a two-thirds referendum of the people. So they were forced to hold a special election in May to appeal to the electorate to pass five new ballot Initiatives to raise taxes.
But when the votes were counted, all five tax-raising Initiatives had been defeated by 60% margins. Even in San Francisco. A sixth Initiative designed by tax opponents to punish legislators who do not balance the budget passed by a more than 70% margin. Even in San Francisco. If one of the most liberal states in the Union is saying no to the soak-the-public philosophy of leftwing legislators, Obama socialism is in big trouble.
(SNIP) Here are the principles of political war that the left understands but conservatives do not:
1. Politics is war conducted by other means
2. Politics is a war of position
3. In political wars the aggressor usually prevails
4. Position is defined by fear and hope
5. The weapons of politics are symbols evoking fear and hope
6. Victory lies on the side of the people
Read more at http://frontpagemag.com/2009/11/26/the-art-of-political-war-for-tea-parties-by-david-horowitz/
George Washington’s 1789 Thanksgiving Proclamation
New York, 3 October 1789
By the President of the United States of America, a Proclamation.
Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favor– and whereas both Houses of Congress have by their joint Committee requested me to recommend to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.
Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be– That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks–for his kind care and protection of the People of this Country previous to their becoming a Nation–for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of his Providence which we experienced in the course and conclusion of the late war–for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty, which we have since enjoyed–for the peaceable and rational manner, in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national One now lately instituted–for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed; and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and in general for all the great and various favors which he hath been pleased to confer upon us.
and also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech him to pardon our national and other transgressions– to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually–to render our national government a blessing to all the people, by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed–to protect and guide all Sovereigns and Nations (especially such as have shewn kindness unto us) and to bless them with good government, peace, and concord–To promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the encrease of science among them and us–and generally to grant unto all Mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as he alone knows to be best.
Given under my hand at the City of New York the third day of October in the year of our Lord 1789.
Go: Washington
Count your blessings on Thanksgiving Day
from patriotpost.us
“It is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His mercy, to implore His protection and favor… That great and beneficent author of all good that was, that is, or ever shall be, that we may then unite in rendering unto Him our sincere and humble thanks for His kind care and protection of the people.” –George Washington, 1st President of the United States, 1789 – 1797
Congress May Probe Leaked Global Warming E-Mails
by Declan McCullagh, CBS News blog, November 24, 2009
A few days after leaked e-mail messages appeared on the Internet, the U.S. Congress may probe whether prominent scientists who are advocates of global warming theories misrepresented the truth about climate change.
Sen. James Inhofe, an Oklahoma Republican, said on Monday the leaked correspondence suggested researchers “cooked the science to make this thing look as if the science was settled, when all the time of course we knew it was not,” according to a transcript of a radio interview posted on his Web site. Aides for Rep. Darrell Issa, a California Republican, are also looking into the disclosure.
The leaked documents (see our previous coverage) come from the Climatic Research Unit of the University of East Anglia in eastern England. In global warming circles, the CRU wields outsize influence: it claims the world’s largest temperature data set, and its work and mathematical models were incorporated into the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s 2007 report. That report, in turn, is what the Environmental Protection Agency acknowledged it “relies on most heavily” when concluding that carbon dioxide emissions endanger public health and should be regulated.
Last week’s leaked e-mails range from innocuous to embarrassing and, critics believe, scandalous. They show that some of the field’s most prominent scientists were so wedded to theories of man-made global warming that they ridiculed dissenters who asked for copies of their data (”have to respond to more crap criticisms from the idiots”), cheered the deaths of skeptical journalists, and plotted how to keep researchers who reached different conclusions from publishing in peer-reviewed journals.
Read more at http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/11/24/taking_liberties/entry5761180.shtml
Obama’s Nice Guy Act Gets Him Nowhere on the World Stage
by Gabor Steingart, Spiegel Online, 11/23/2009
When he entered office, US President Barack Obama promised to inject US foreign policy with a new tone of respect and diplomacy. His recent trip to Asia, however, showed that it’s not working. A shift to Bush-style bluntness may be coming.
There were only a few hours left before Air Force One was scheduled to depart for the flight home. US President Barack Obama trip through Asia had already seen him travel 24,000 kilometers, sit through a dozen state banquets, climb the Great Wall of China and shake hands with Korean children. It was high time to take stock of the trip.
Barack Obama looked tired on Thursday, as he stood in the Blue House in Seoul, the official residence of the South Korean president. He also seemed irritable and even slightly forlorn. The CNN cameras had already been set up. But then Obama decided not to play along, and not to answer the question he had already been asked several times on his trip: what did he plan to take home with him? Instead, he simply said “thank you, guys,” and disappeared. David Axelrod, senior advisor to the president, fielded the journalists’ questions in the hallway of the Blue House instead, telling them that the public’s expectations had been “too high.”
The mood in Obama’s foreign policy team is tense following an extended Asia trip that produced no palpable results. The “first Pacific president,” as Obama called himself, came as a friend and returned as a stranger. The Asians smiled but made no concessions.
Read more at http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,662822,00.html
HEALTH CARE: What could possibly go wrong?
Let me get this straight . . .
we’re going to pass a health care plan,
written by a committee,
whose chairman says he doesn’t understand it,
passed by a Congress that hasn’t read it but exempts themselves from it,
to be signed by a president that also hasn’t read it and who smokes,
with funding administered by a treasury chief who didn’t pay his taxes,
all to be overseen by a surgeon general who is obese,
and financed by a country that’s nearly broke,
and administered by a country who has overrun every program it has managed . . .
What could possibly go wrong?
Hiding evidence of global cooling
The Washington Times, Editorial, Nov. 24, 2009
Scientific progress depends on accurate and complete data. It also relies on replication. The past couple of days have uncovered some shocking revelations about the baloney practices that pass as sound science about climate change.
It was announced Thursday afternoon that computer hackers had obtained 160 megabytes of e-mails from the Climate Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia (UEA) in England. Those e-mails involved communication among many scientific researchers and policy advocates with similar ideological positions all across the world. Those purported authorities were brazenly discussing the destruction and hiding of data that did not support global-warming claims.
Professor Phil Jones, the head of the Climate Research Unit, and professor Michael E. Mann at Pennsylvania State University, who has been an important scientist in the climate debate, have come under particular scrutiny. Among his e-mails, Mr. Jones talked to Mr. Mann about the “trick of adding in the real temps to each series … to hide the decline [in temperature].”
Read more at http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/nov/24/hiding-evidence-of-global-cooling/
The Wilding of Sarah Palin
by Robin of Berkeley, November 24, 2009
When I was in college, I read a book that changed my life. It was Susan Brownmiller’s tome, Against Our Will: Men, Women, and Rape, which explained rape as an act of power, not just lust. What I found particularly chilling was the chapter on war — how rape is used to terrorize a population and destroy the enemy’s spirit.
While edifying, the book magnified the vulnerability I already felt as a female. Fear of rape became a constant dread, and I sought a solution that would help shield me from danger.
(SNIP) I finally beheld what my eyes had refused to see: that leftists are Mr. and Ms. Misogyny. Both the males and the females don’t care a whit about women.
Women are continually sacrificed on the altar of political correctness. If under Radical Islam women are enshrouded and stoned and beheaded, so be it.
My other epiphanies:those pony tailed guys were not marching for abortion rights because they cherished women’s reproductive freedom. It was to keep women available for free and easy sex.
And the eagerness for women to make good money? If women work hard, leftist men don’t have to.
(SNIP) In the wilding of Sarah Palin, the Left shows its true colors. Rather than a shelter for the vulnerable, leftists will mow down any man, woman, or child who gets in their way. Not a movement of hope and change, it is a cauldron of hate.
From Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Hatred paralyzes life; love releases it. Hatred confuses life; love harmonizes it. Hatred darkens life; love illuminates it.
In these dark times, with spiritually bankrupt people at the helm, thank God we have bright lights like Sarah Palin to illuminate the darkness.
Read the whole thing at http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/11/the_wilding_of_sarah_palin.html
Well written!
NYTimes: We Won’t Publish “Statements that Were Never Intended for the Public Eye.”
by Michael Goldfarb, November 22, 2009
With the release of hundreds of emails by scientists advocates of global warming showing obvious and entirely inappropriate collusion by the authors — including attempts to suppress dissent, to punish journals that publish peer-reviewed studies casting doubt on global warming, and to manipulate data to bolster their own arguments — even the New York Times is forced to concede that “the documents will undoubtedly raise questions about the quality of research on some specific questions and the actions of some scientists.” But apparently the paper’s environmental blog, Dot Earth, is taking a pass on publishing any of the documents and emails that are now circulating.
More at http://www.weeklystandard.com/weblogs/TWSFP/2009/11/nytimes_we_wont_publish_statem.asp
Journalism, what journalism?
If Obama’s Lost Saturday Night Live, He’s Lost…
Permission to laugh at Obama, sir?
Permission granted.
Hilarious video at link below, but do NOT view while children are in the room.
SNL Obama Jintao Press Conference in Beijing (VIDEO, 6:44)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NxYSduRES1o
“I am noticing that each of your plans to save money involves spending even more money.” That’s not exactly a revelation to those who have been paying attention, but it’s legitimate political commentary that may be news to some in the SNL audience.
From http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2009/11/025002.php
++++
Q: What’s the real problem with Barack Obama jokes?
A: His followers don’t think they’re funny and everyone else doesn’t think they’re jokes.
It’s Almost Too Late to Escape Pelosi’s New Year’s Eve Tax Trap
by David Galland, Managing Director, Casey Research, Saturday, November 21, 2009
The administration knows its massive deficits will be poison come the November 2010 midterm elections. At the same time, it also knows if it cuts stimulus spending, it risks kicking the props out from under the recovery just ahead of those same elections.
There’s only one way out. That’s to boost revenues… and soon. It would be political suicide for Obama to break his pledge not to raise taxes on the middle class. So all that’s left is to mug the “wealthy.”
It’s already a given that taxes are going up for higher income earners and investors. Most importantly, the administration and its Congressional allies have announced they’ll allow the Bush tax cuts to expire in 2011. Those cuts, passed in 2001 and 2003, reduced personal income taxes and capital gains taxes, as well as eliminated the estate tax.
Once the Bush tax cuts expire, high earners will see their personal income taxes rise from 35% to 39.6%. (And probably go up from there. The House health care bill includes an additional 5.4% surtax on gross income for high-income individuals.) In addition, the estate tax will return.
(SNIP) Further, when passed, the legislation will be retroactive to January 1, 2010.
Read more at http://www.dailywealth.com/archive/2009/nov/2009_nov_21.asp
Think that it won’t happen?? You have been warned.
Climategate: how the MSM reported the greatest scandal in modern science
by James Delingpole, November 21, 2009
Here’s what the Times has had to say on the subject:
E-mails allegedly written by some of the world’s leading climate scientists have been stolen by hackers and published on websites run by climate change sceptics.
The sceptics claim that the e-mails are evidence that scientists manipulated data in order to strengthen their argument that human activities were causing global warming.
(Yep – definitely an improvement on their earlier, non-existent coverage; but not exactly pointing up the scandalousness of this scandal).
And the Independent:
(Yep. Nada).
And here’s how The New York Times (aka Pravda) reported it:
Hundreds of private e-mail messages and documents hacked from a computer server at a British university are causing a stir among global warming skeptics, who say they show that climate scientists conspired to overstate the case for a human influence on climate change.
(Yep. That’s right. It has only apparently caused a stir among ’skeptics’. Everyone else can rest easy. Nothing to see here.)
( SNIP ) Like the Telegraph’s MPs’ expenses scandal, this is the gift that goes on giving. It won’t, unfortunately, derail Copenhagen (too many vested interests involved) or cause any of our many political parties to start talking sense on “Climate change”. But what it does demonstrate is the growing level of public scepticism towards Al Gore’s Anthropogenic Global Warming theory. That’s why, for example, this story is the single most read item on today’s Telegraph website.
What it also demonstrates – as my dear chum Dan Hannan so frequently and rightly argues – is the growing power of the Blogosphere and the decreasing relevance of the Mainstream Media (MSM).
This is not altogether the MSM’s fault. Partly it is just the way of things that more and more readers prefer their news and opinion served up in snappier, less reverent, more digestible and instant for.
But in the case of “Climate Change”, the MSM has been caught with its trousers down. The reason it has been so ill-equipped to report on this scandal is because almost all of its Environmental Correspondents and Environmental Editors are parti pris members of the Climate-Fear Promotion lobby. Most of their contacts (and information sources) work for biased lobby groups like Greenpeace and the WWF, or conspicuously pro-AGW government departments and Quangos such as the Carbon Trust. How can they bring themselves to report on skullduggery at Hadley Centre when the scientists involved are the very ones whose work they have done most to champion and whose pro-AGW views they share?
As Upton Sinclair once said:
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his job depends on not understanding it.”
So don’t expect this scandal to be written up in the MSM any time soon. But why would you want to anyway? It’s all here, where the free spirits and independent thinkers are, on the Blogosphere.
Tom the Taxer raises the fees to park in front of your OWN house
by Bruce Murphy, Milwaukee Magazine, Tuesday 11/10/2009
(SNIP) Not Taxes But Fees Once upon a time, city of Milwaukee residents just paid a property tax. But since at least the 1990s, city officials have been adding fees, and now they have an all-out love affair with them. Last week, a Common Council committee proposed increases in the garbage fee, stormwater fee and sewer fee.
(SNIP) One example is the night parking fee, which is essentially a tax on poor people and some apartment dwellers. Most middle-class homeowners have a garage and aren’t parking on the street. But in densely crowded, older, generally poorer neighborhoods, there are lots of people without access to a garage who get socked a night parking fee. It’s quite unfair. Recognizing this, former Mayor John Norquist declared that he would support the abolition of the fee in the late 1990s, but the Common Council wasn’t excited about losing this revenue. It’s bad enough the fee exists. But last week the Common Council increased the night parking fee for the first time since 1950, increasing it from $44 to $55 a year. Mayor Tom Barrett still has to review the budget, and could chose to veto this item.
Read more at http://www.milwaukeemagazine.com/murphyslaw/default.asp?newmessageid=25121
UPDATE: Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett chose NOT to veto this item. See http://www.jsonline.com/news/milwaukee/70407867.html
Now, if you want to park in front of your OWN house in the city of Milwaukee, be prepared to pay EVEN MORE. Thanks Tom.
And who is running for governor? And what will he do to our state?
White House at odds with bishops over abortion
By RICARDO ALONSO-ZALDIVAR, November 20, 2009
WASHINGTON (AP) - The White House is on a collision course with Catholic bishops in an intractable dispute over abortion that could blow up the fragile political coalition behind President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul.
A top Obama administration official on Thursday praised the new Senate health care bill’s attempt to find a compromise on abortion coverage - even as an official of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said Sen. Harry Reid’s bill is the worst he’s seen so far on the divisive issue.
Read more at http://apnews.myway.com/article/20091120/D9C39JS81.html
House panel approves Ron Paul’s proposal to audit the Federal Reserve
By: Victoria McGrane, November 19, 2009The House Financial Services Committee has approved Rep. Ron Paul’s measure to drastically expand the government’s power to audit the Federal Reserve.
The measure, based on a Paul proposal that has attracted more than 300 co-sponsors, passed, 43-26, as an amendment to a financial reform bill. Florida Democrat and fellow Fed critic Alan Grayson co-sponsored the amendment with Paul and played a leading role drumming up support for it among committee members. The adoption of this amendment is an extraordinary victory for Paul, whose libertarian, anti-Fed leanings have often been dismissed by the political establishment.
Read more at http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1109/29734.html
Both local congressmen Ryan and Sensenbrenner have sponsored H.R. 1207 “Audit the Fed”, but not Gwen Moore!
CRG Network: Issues budget veto analysis decries supervisor’s public attacks against constituents
November 18, 2009
CRG Network has prepared a preliminary analysis of the 2010 Budget vetoes (see attached spreadsheet). Of 35 items vetoed by the County Executive, 21 contained spending reductions totaling $12,409,306. The county board sustained 8 of those vetoes to reduce spending $6,748,828 equal to 54% of the requested reductions. Key victories in the attempt to reduce spending and structural deficits included votes to sustain the privatization of housekeeping functions and an increase in county employee furlough days.
The board also sustained 2 vetoes that transferred $2,540,000 of bonding into the current operating levy as is called for under generally accepted accounting principles. The net effect of these 10 vetoes was to limit the property tax levy increase to $5,533,164 or 2.15% over the 2009 budget (preliminary CRG figures vary slightly from the preliminary county board estimates).
Of special note is that 12 supervisors voted as a block to override all 21 spending reduction vetoes requiring unanimity among the remaining 7 to sustain a spending veto. Those 12 supervisors were Broderick, Clark, Coggs, Dimitrijevic, Holloway, Johnson, Larson, Lipscomb, Mayo, Thomas, Weishan, and West.
Read more at http://www.wispolitics.com/index.iml?Article=177397