I plan to resume blogging Sunday evening or so...
Another Inconvenient Truth
1 hour ago
Friday, May 22, 2009
House Dem Calls Bill a 'Ponzi Scheme' -- 'If the vote was today, I'd vote 'no' | Climate Depot
Excerpt from E&E News - May 22, 2009 (Subscription required)
[Gene] Taylor, an 11-term [Democrat] congressman from the Mississippi Gulf Coast, is not ready to buy into the climate bill. "I think of the whole cap-and-trade idea as a Ponzi scheme," Taylor said. "I don't like the idea that one factory is cleaner than it has to be so that another a factory is dirtier than it should be, because historically that factory that's dirtier than it should be ends up in the South. ... If the vote was today, I'd vote 'no.'
Speed Reading Clerk Reads Stalling Amendment To House Climate Change Legislation | TPMDC
His services may ultimately not be necessary, but earlier today, to break the tension between battling factions, the committee's ranking member Joe Barton (R-TX) asked the "speed reader clerk" to read part of one measly little amendment. Watch...
Daily Kos: Climate Change - the new Russian Roulette
This is just appalling.Cap And Trade Isn’t Environmental Policy It’s Revenue Policy | KXNet.com North Dakota News
That per North Dakota Public Service Commissioner Kevin Cramer...
World Climate Report » Waxman-Markey: A completely futile legislative exercise
The bottom line here is that we are talking about global temperature savings on the order of one or two tenths of a degree by the end of the century even if the rest of the developed world does the same—values that are virtually meaningless when held against the total projected temperature rise.Utah's Next Governor Doesn't Buy Human-Caused Global Warming | Green Business | Reuters
Now that President Obama has tapped Utah Governor Jon Huntsman, a Republican, as the next U.S. Ambassador to China, attention has turned to his likely replacement, Utah Lieutenant Governor Gary Herbert, and the direction the new governor plans on taking the state. While observers don't expect any sudden policy reversals, Herbert's position on the human-causes of global warming stands in striking opposition to his predecessor's.
Coffee City | Starbucks weighs in on climate change
Global warming poses "a direct business threat to our company," Jim Hanna, director of environmental impact for Starbucks, said at a public hearing before the Environmental Protection Agency at Bell Harbor Conference Center this morning.The Reference Frame: Global warming 512 times worse than previously thought
That's the summary of nine most recent reports that "global warming will be twice as bad as expected".Fuzzy math? Letter writer rightly wonders why “we must reduce our consumption of CO2 by 50 percent because we are contributing 0.00104 percent of the atmospheric CO2″ | GORE LIED
23,000 miners to lose jobs under carbon trading: industry - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
The mining industry has released modelling saying 23,500 jobs will be lost by 2020 under the Federal Government's emissions trading scheme.Steven Pearlstein - Climate-Change Bill Hits Some of the Right Notes but Botches the Refrain - washingtonpost.com
The Waxman-Markey bill may be the best bill that the political system can produce, and surely it is far preferable to doing nothing. But now that we know what a climate-change bill looks like when it is jury-rigged to accommodate all the special interests, maybe Americans will be willing to reconsider one of the cleaner, simpler approaches -- a carbon tax with all the revenue rebated to households, for example, or a cap-and-trade system that generates enough revenue to erase the national debt, or even a tough new regulatory regime requiring businesses to produce more fuel-efficient cars, buildings and appliances.theblogprof: Author Henry Waxman On His Cap-And-Trade Bill: “I don’t know the details. I rely on the scientists.”
It's not too late to change our minds.
Thursday, May 21, 2009
The Associated Press: House panel advances global warming [swindle] bill
WASHINGTON (AP) — Legislation imposing the first nationwide limits on the pollution blamed for global warming advanced in the House late Thursday, clearing a key committee despite strong Republican opposition.
The Energy and Commerce Committee approved the sweeping climate bill 33-25 after repeatedly turning back GOP attempts to kill or weaken the measure during four days of debate.
American Thinker: The Alice in Wonderland World of the Greens
An irrational fear of ‘climate apocalypse' has driven nature-worshipping green ideologues in every age generation. Being inherently anti-capitalist they care little whether their demands threaten to bankrupt modern economies, or deny poorer nations the same cheap, hydro-carbon powered industrialization path out of poverty taken by developed nations. For Green World, preposterous self-righteous claims are morally self-evident, Real World facts and reason mere irrelevancies. "The adventures first," said the Gryphon to Alice, "explanations take such as long time."Waxman-Markey bears high price tag for families, businesses - Bill Archer and Charles Stenholm - POLITICO.com
American families are now focused on keeping their jobs, recovering the remnants of their retirement plans and making it to their next paycheck. As such, the timing could not be worse for another bite at this bitter apple. Yet some of our former House colleagues are determined to do just that with legislation to impose a cap-and-trade system, which will be voted on in committee this week. While the end goals of the legislation may be well-intentioned, the economic consequences for consumers and workers will be hard to swallow any way they slice it.Cap and Trade vs. the American Dream by Michael G. Franc on National Review Online
...consumers respond to dramatically higher energy prices by changing their behavior. This means that the Waxman-Markey approach contains within it a hidden mandate, one that will force us, like it or not, to change our way of life dramatically. We’ll end up with shorter and fewer family vacations, smaller homes and cars, constricted commutes and (by extension) fewer job opportunities, fewer consumer purchases, etc. In other words, the only way average Americans can satisfy this unforgiving mandate is to do without things that matter to them and their families. We are being asked to forgo the sort of mobility, both literally and in the traditional American Dream sense of that word, that has defined our nation for generations.
If these tradeoffs receive the attention they deserve, the odds that anything even remotely resembling Waxman-Markey will be enacted into law go from slim to none.
This is the cap-and-trade lifestyle factor, and it keeps politicians awake at night.
Australians Back [Delaying Climate Swindle Scheme Until 2011]
(Angus Reid Global Monitor) - Half of adults in Australia believe their government is right to modify its emissions trading scheme to combat climate change, according to a poll by Essential Research. 49 per cent approve of the decision, while 31 per cent disapprove.Greenpeace founder claims group now energy inefficient | montgomeryadvertiser.com | Montgomery Advertiser
A founder of Greenpeace said today's environmental movement is blocking meaningful clean energy development.Al Gore dials for votes on warming bill - Lisa Lerer - POLITICO.com
Patrick Moore, who now is co-chair of the Clean and Safe Energy Coalition, said environmentalists, especially those aligned with former Vice President Al Gore, have hijacked the clean energy debate.
He said the movement's fixation on solar energy, which he called inefficient, has hindered exploration of other energy sources, such as geothermal and even nuclear power, which he once opposed.
House Democrats backing controversial climate change legislation have been getting a hidden helping hand this week from Al Gore.
Over the past few days, the former vice president and environmental activist has mobilized his green grass roots, marshaled his well-endowed lobbying organization and even personally called Democratic committee members in an effort to push the bill through the House Energy and Commerce Committee and through Congress.
“I have enormous respect for Al Gore. When it comes to climate change, he’s the guru,” said Rep. Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.).
Who's to blame for winter that just won't end? Maybe it's a dastardly Russian plot - Winnipeg Free Press
Once upon a time -- as all good stories are supposed to begin -- their kingdom was a place of warm and beautiful springs, the kind of springs you only read about in stories that begin with the words "once upon a time."Epsom Hospital services overwhelmed by outbreak of winter norovirus, report shows (From Epsom Guardian)
But now there was a darkness upon the land and their dreams of backyard barbecues and digging in the garden and going to the beach and baking their pasty white skin were being snowed under by The Winter That Refused To End.
The people were sad. But mostly they were cranky. Big-time cranky.
In a statement a spokesman for Epsom and St Helier University Hospitals NHS Trust said: “The additional pressures we faced at Epsom and St Helier hospitals as a result of the cold weather and more seasonal illnesses were certainly not unique to our Trust.
Coalition accuses Senator Wong of dodging scrutiny of emissions trading scheme | The Australian
CLIMATE Change Minister Penny Wong will be overseas next Tuesday and will miss Senate Estimates hearings on climate change.Rangel Wants Health Care Before Climate Change
Don't even think about climate change before health care, Charlie Rangel said Wednesday night.
Long on the periphery of the climate-change debate, Rangel (D-N.Y.) announced Wednesday that his House Ways and Means Committee will make health care its top priority in the coming months and has no intention of turning to climate change in the meantime.
Climate Change Fraud - Because the debate is not over - Discover Magazine Blog Goes After Morano and Skeptics Everywhere
It seems Mooney has a distaste for anyone who questions mainstream science (you know, the science built on consensus), because in his view it is vanishing from the mainstream media. Huh? Did he forget the swine flu scare that the mainstream science warned would decimate the planet over the course of a few weeks? And he makes the point by pointing out, "The army of climate skeptics descending here via Morano’s link, posting comments making claims that have been soundly refuted a gazillion times..."American Thinker: One and a Half Cheers for Interior Secretary Salazar
He lays down the following challenge...
Exactly a year ago President Bush's Interior Sec. , Dirk Kempthorne, under pressure from greenies and global warmists, invoked the U.S. Endangered Species Act to list polar bears as "a threatened species." The listing was idiotic; in fact polar bear numbers have doubled worldwide over the past 30 years. And three years earlier Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, acting on the advice of people who actually live around polar bears, had filed suit against the Dept. of the Interior to prevent the listing.Ominous Carbon Dioxide Shortfall « Global Warming: A Worn-Out Hoax
The human contribution to atmospheric carbon dioxide is tailing off, rapidly.
Unless there is some other dominant source of carbon dioxide that is tailing off.
Temperature is tailing off.
Gore vs. Hansen: Enviros take sides in debate over House climate [swindle] bill | Grist
The Waxman-Markey climate and energy bill, now moving through the House, is polarizing the environmental community. Longtime climate crusader Al Gore says we should do all we can to get the legislation passed; top climate scientist James Hansen says we should demand a different, better bill. Activists and environmental groups are picking sides or staking out positions in the middle.Carbon Credit Derivatives Aren't The New Credit Default Swaps. No, Really.
'Lessons learned;' Dems Swear New See-No-Evil Policy Won't Revive Old Scams, Bring New RecessionsWill EPA or Congress Call the Shots on CO2? Democrats Vote to Trust Enviro-Bureaucrats
WASHINGTON – An amendment offered by Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., would establish that carbon dioxide, water vapor, and other greenhouse gases are not air pollutants under the Clean Air Act. This amendment will prevent the Environmental Protection Agency from imposing intrusive regulations into all aspects of American’s lives.
Climate change: The century's biggest health threat? - The Globe and Mail
Climate change is usually considered mainly an environmental calamity, with humans largely immune to its devastating effects.Intrade Prediction Markets still suggest that cap-and-trade is a long shot for '09
But a new report warns that people won't escape unscathed from global warming, which will likely turn out to be the biggest threat to human health this century, causing the spread of diseases, increased malnutrition and other severe medical problems.
Or trillions?: Global warming of 7C 'could kill billions this century' - Telegraph
Global temperatures could rise by more than 7C this century killing billions of people and leaving the world on the brink of total collapse, according to new research.Daishin eyes climate change commodity plays
HONG KONG, May 22 (Reuters) - Daishin Investment Trust Management, which runs a climate change fund that invests in companies engaged in disaster relief, plans a new commodities fund this year to capitalise on the effects of global warming.
Yong-Jin Kim, who manages Daishin's $20 million Global Climate Change fund, likes makers of fire trucks, rescue gadgets and satellite systems as governments tighten disaster relief procedures amid a changing global climate.
The Green Bubble, by Ted Nordhaus and Michael Shellenberger
Why environmentalism keeps imploding.East Bay Republican Examiner: The climate change religion: Separating church and state
Just like the “Pet Rock” fad of the 1970’s, “man-made global warming” is now officially part of pop culture past. It rode off into the warm sunset along with Al Gore’s relevance and Rosy O’Donnell’s television career. I look forward to a future episode of “VH1’s I love the New Millennium” where they gather a bunch of comedians to time warp back to 2008 and cleverly lampoon all the environmental religious left folks who scared school children into thinking the world was going to end in the name of man-made global warming.
...
My problem with the church of climate change began when the religious left started blurring the lines between personal conservation and public policy. When climate change suddenly transitioned from a personal religious belief to a full-blown bureaucratic state controlled tool to create new taxes and increase the size of government. A “big brother” that wants to monitor your home thermostat and mandate how you run your business.
The environmental religious left in this country has become everything they detest about the Christian religious right. And more.
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Terence Corcoran: Capped, traded and scammed by fake markets - Full Comment
Not that we needed proof that the ideology of market mechanisms and carbon taxes as a cure to environmental problems is a total sham. We now have enough evidence to convict the perpetrators for first degree economic policy fraud. The evidence mounts around the world, but now mostly in the United States of America, where President Barack Obama and Democrats in Congress are on the brink of burying real markets in energy and automobiles under the biggest command-and-control economic experiments since the great totalitarian regimes of the 20th century.
On the climate scam, why can't Obama unite even the Democrats?
TheHill.com - Cap-and-trade showdown
A committee chairman is threatening House leaders to either give him a role in shaping climate change legislation or risk losing every Democratic vote on his panel when the bill hits the floor.
Rep. Collin Peterson (Minn.), the outspoken Democratic chairman of the Agriculture panel, has been making it well-known that he wants his committee to have full jurisdictional authority over whatever climate change bill emerges from Chairman Henry Waxman’s (D-Calif.) Energy and Commerce Committee.
But Peterson is no longer making idle threats.
Peterson earlier this week met with the 26 Democrats on his panel and emerged with a “virtually unanimous” agreement that his committee members would stand with him in opposition to a climate change bill that didn’t adequately address the concerns of the agriculture industry, according to one of those Democrats.
“We’ve thrown a pitchfork in the sand,” the Democrat said.
Buffett's energy company opposes Waxman-Markey Climate [Swindle] Bill
MidAmerican Energy Holdings Company Opposes Waxman-Markey Climate Change Bill
“Cap and trade will have a profoundly negative impact on people who are struggling to make ends meet in an economy still in distress,” Sokol added.MidAmerican Energy Holdings Company: Information from Answers.com
Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway controls the company.
GOPer: Climate Bill Will Create 'Global Warming Gestapo' | TPMDC
Waxman: "I'd like to ask a question of the gentleman (Mr. Scalise), you've said global warming Gestapo, what does that mean?" Scalise: It basically is the powers that are vested in the Secretary under Section 201 of this cap and trade energy tax, to go into someone's house, number one to go in, and then charge them. Waxman: "So if anybody does something you don't like you call them Gestapo? What do you think of the people who run other government agencies, do you think the government is made up of Gestapo?" Scalise: "I don't think the government should be able to tell somebody if they're living in their home and they're abiding by all the laws that they're an unlawful occupant of their house, that's the terminology of the bill, that's frightening."Bjorn Lomborg: The Climate-Industrial Complex - WSJ.com
There would be an outcry -- and rightfully so -- if big oil organized a climate change conference and invited only climate-change deniers.
The partnership among self-interested businesses, grandstanding politicians and alarmist campaigners truly is an unholy alliance. The climate-industrial complex does not promote discussion on how to overcome this challenge in a way that will be best for everybody. We should not be surprised or impressed that those who stand to make a profit are among the loudest calling for politicians to act. Spending a fortune on global carbon regulations will benefit a few, but dearly cost everybody else.
West Virginia - Meteorologists offer ‘good news’ for Memorial Day
Southern West Virginia residents have endured a miserable, seemingly endless winter that left snow on the ground before Halloween and frost warnings in mid-May.Frost warning issued
But meteorologists say Memorial Day weekend weather will be a very welcome break for those weary of cold, snow and severe flooding.
Environment Canada has issued a frost warning for all of southern Saskatchewan.BC: Cold temperatures delay fruit harvest
The frost warning highlights the fact that the temperature for all of Saskatchewan is forecast to drop to zero or lower overnight.
A long winter and a late spring have pushed back the dates for fruit production in area orchards.
Hank Markgraf, field services manager with the Okanagan Tree Fruit Cooperative, says the late spring means the blossoms are on the trees much later than usual.
[Because of their alleged belief in the greatest scientific fraud of all time] Democrats Create Best Practices for Your Hot Tub
WASHINGTON – Three amendments offered en bloc by Rep. George Radanovich R-Calif., would prevent the federal government from imposing regulations on portable electric spas, hot food cabinets and water dispensers. Restricting the production of these goods will damage more than just these industries. These regulations will hinder consumer choice, raise prices and expand federal government regulation into more aspects of daily life.The sounds of silence
U.S. Rep. Lee Terry, R-Neb.: Mr. Weiner, how much of this bill was written by the National Resources Defense Council? And who was in the room?New Zealand: Winter arrives early
U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner, D-N.Y.:
Rep. Terry: Seeing that you won’t answer, I’ll yield to Mr. Buyer.
Rotorua awoke to the rare sight of snow this morning with the eastern suburbs and hills behind the airport coated.
Weather analyst Philip Duncan said the cold snap was set to continue until tomorrow as winter had "well and truly arrived early".
"It's like we haven't had an autumn.
"We are two months away from the coldest part of the year, so to see temperatures this low is certainly eyebrow-raising."
Antarctic Coup de Grace « the Air Vent
If “robust” means the same answer pops out of a fancy computer algorithm regardless of what the input data is, then I guess Antarctic warming is, indeed, “robust”.House Energy and Commerce Committee Continues Debate on Climate-Change [Swindle] Bill - washingtonpost.com
The House Energy and Commerce Committee has just reconvened for another long evening, having spent the day debating changes to mammoth climate-change legislation, still without reaching the bill's halfway point.Utilities, Coal-State Dems are Wrecking Our Last Chance on Climate Change | SolveClimate.com
Again, the goal is to create the strongest possible carbon cap. To be strong, the cap must be simple and fair. Achieve these two features and voters will support it for the fifty years it takes to squeeze carbon out of our economy. Fail at these two features and the patient will remain tragically sick for many years to come.
Seattle Environmental Policy Examiner: Global warming blamed for [extreme cold]
The impact on human suffering and rising death toll related to extreme heat and extreme cold, has been increasing every year and according to experts in the field of public health, it will continue to get worse.[Allegedly] High Odds of [Allegedly] Hot Times - Dot Earth Blog - NYTimes.com
The Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change at M.I.T. has published work, described earlier this year, that greatly elevates the odds of calamitous global warming should no significant action be taken to stem the buildup of greenhouse gases. The team ran a suite of 400 computer simulations incorporating both what is known about how the climate could react to a greenhouse-gas buildup and a wide range of variations in the global economy and other human factors that might affect the outcome.Airport reports record low temperature | BlueRidgeNow.com | Times-News Online | Hendersonville, NC
Asheville Regional Airport reported a record low of 35 degrees, breaking a mark of 36 set in 1976.
Some farmers took preemptive measures Monday to battle the threatened frost.
Jeremy Sizemore used 20,000 foam cups to cover his eggplant, tomato and pepper plants. It took 14 workers and three hours to complete the task.
The 8-ounce white cups served as an insulator, protecting the crops at Cane Creek Valley Farm in Fletcher.
GOP can yet prevail in a diverse America, Barbour asserts | csmonitor.com
Barbour also was outspoken about Obama administration proposals to counter climate change.Cap-and-trade: how much would the legislation tame global warming? | CEJournal
“It is an issue that has to be addressed, but the cost of what the president has proposed is so enormous that it is an awful attempt at a solution,” he says. “The energy policy of America ought to be more American energy, more affordable energy. Obama’s policy is more expensive energy and it will reduce the amount of American energy.”
So if you’re wondering what impact it might have on climate, these numbers should give you some guidance. But again, caveat emptor: these model runs hide quite a bit of uncertainty. Your mileage may vary.Roger Pielke comment on the complete nonsense at the link above
Two realities separate your scenario from the real world.Has the Environmental Movement Been Torn Apart?
1. There is no hope or even provision for a cap and trade policy of any sort to be implemented globally. China and India have already stated they won’t play. Even if they did regulating flows across borders would require a global government - not gonna happen.
2. The scenario assumes that WM works. It won’t.
But more than anything, [Patrick Moore, a co-founder of Greenpeace has] lambasted activists for mounting "fear-based" campaigns about global warming.
"Many environmental campaigns are based on fear," he says. "Climate change, again, words like catastrophe and apocalypse, the collapse of human civilization, this is sensationalism.
"There's no evidence to show that that's going to happen. As a matter of fact right now the climate doesn't seem to be changing. Since 1996, there hasn't been any evidence the climate is changing."
Geri Spieler: A Modest Proposal (With Apologies to Jonathan Swift)
The solution of course is to slow population growth. The benefits from reduced reproduction rates among humans are 20 times more effective than life style changes. So, obviously we can reduce carbon emissions by reducing the number of new children.Fred Upton weighs in
Republicans on the call also hit the Democrats hard over cap and trade, with Congressman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) warning that "[Henry] Waxman probably has the votes to narrowly pass this thing in committee" and that "we need to get all the Blue Dogs" to be able to stop it in the full House. "This cap and trade stuff just reeks," Upton said of Waxman-Markey.YouTube - Rep. Joe Barton on Global Warming Bill
Rep. Joe Barton talks to C-SPAN's Washington Journal about the Waxman-Markey global warming bill.
Lack of global warming strikes Iowa
FOREST CITY - The opening of the Forest City Aquatic Center is being delayed because officials are dealing with maintenance issues caused by a “harsh winter,” Parks and Recreation Director Sue Edmondson said on Monday.It takes a village of idiots
...
She said she did take solace in the fact that because of that harsh winter, Forest City schoolchildren won't be out of school next week, when the pool was originally scheduled to be open. Because of snow days, the last day of classes at Forest City Community Schools has been pushed back from this Friday to June 2.
...the real war on kids is taking place in the classroom and the movie theater. That's where the real terror is lurking these days, just waiting to ruin the dreams of children. It takes the form of nonstop propaganda about global warming.
When I was a child, the bogyman was an imaginary creature hiding under my bed. Now, thanks to Al Gore and his ilk, bogymen are lurching across the countryside like the zombies in horror movies, terrifying the kids. That's all the kids, including the little sons and daughters of liberals. According to recent studies, a huge percentage of 10-year-olds believe the earth will be entirely under water before they're grown-up. I call it child abuse, and if those parents weren't a bunch of politically correct, brain-dead pantywaists, they'd put a stop to it. Instead, they take their kids to see left-wing pap like "Earth," and they cheer on people like Gore and Pelosi, who are making millions upon millions of dollars off their investments in this massive hoax. These self-righteous cretins love green, OK; greenbacks, that is.
Unlike Chicken Little, who insisted the sky was falling, and scared all the critters in the barnyard, these greedy little creeps are screaming that the ice is melting, and scaring all the kids in the schoolyard.
CLIMATE CHANGE: 200 Days to Copenhagen
...Hedegaard pointed to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates as two unlikely but apparently willing leaders in moving toward less oil-dependent economies.Druggie uses frost as defence - Local News - Cairns, QLD, Australia
"I think it would be stupid for countries like India and China to pursue the path of developed countries. As developing countries, we have to find our own paths; we don’t need our buildings to be air-conditioned all the time," said Dr. Rajendra K. Pachauri, chair of the IPCC, in a discussion at Columbia University’s School of Journalism Tuesday.
A WOMAN busted with almost 1000 dope plants was spared jail yesterday after she blamed the harsh Tableland frosts for needing to grow such a big crop.Any questions?: Baby Boom In ND
But pediatrician Lisa Kozel says the numbers started to climb last year. She says the clinic now averages between 110 and 120 births per month.
Kozel says the harsh winter might have been a factor.
GE's Jeff Immelt: Global Warming 'Compelling'; Cap-and-Trade Most 'Effective' Way to Go
CEO of parent company of NBC Universal argues for carbon price to create 'certainty.'The Flawed Logic of The Cap-and-Trade Debate by Ted Nordhaus and Michael Shellenberger: Yale Environment 360
Two prominent — and iconoclastic — environmentalists argue that current efforts to tax or cap carbon emissions are doomed to failure and that the answer lies not in making dirty energy expensive but in making clean energy cheap.Frost, cold weather, rain delays Michigan crops | The Packer
HUDSONVILLE, Mich. — Growers in Southwest Michigan woke up to frost on their crops in mid-May, possibly delaying even more already behind-schedule summer crops.Red Deer Advocate - Late, cold spring hard on gardeners, birds — and bugs
Winter continues to hang on in Central Alberta, keeping gardeners and naturalists wondering if they’ll ever get their plants in the ground or if birds will make it through a difficult spring.
There was a bit of good news from the cool and snowy weather that began late Sunday, carrying into Tuesday and today.
C3: Waxman/Markey Global Warming Tax Legislation Creates 12 New Advisory Boards? Bureaucracy "Stimulus" Bill?
Read here. 'Cap & Trade' legislation is not about saving the planet. Besides $2 trillion in potential revenues, it's about control via bureaucratic mechanisms, like 12 "advisory boards." If 'cap & trade' is a market-oriented solution, as promoted by its authors, why would 12 advisory boards and other committees need to be established?Climate Bill Could Be a $750 Billion Boon for Consumers, Study Finds - Green Inc. Blog - NYTimes.com
Opponents of climate legislation paint efforts to reduce carbon emissions as “cap and tax” policy, but a new analysis of the current House proposal to curb greenhouse gas emissions finds that consumers would receive around $750 billion in direct and indirect handouts and subsidies through 2030 to offset the higher energy costs.If handouts are a "boon", why don't we just hand out $1 billion to each American next month?
Committee on Energy and Commerce, Republicans : Press Release :: Will Global Warming Bill Costs Be Disclosed On Utility Bills? Upset Dems Say No
Cranky Opposition to Transparency Plan Caroms from Blaming Bush SEC to Torture to Katrina ReliefCommittee on Energy and Commerce, Republicans : Press Release :: Democrats Reject Cap on Job Losses
15% Unemployment Not Enough to Suspend Global Warming BillCommittee on Energy and Commerce, Republicans : Press Release :: Democrats Vote to Allow $5 Gasoline
Barton: ‘If we can put a cap on carbon, we darn sure ought to be able to put a cap on gasoline price increases from this bill.’C3: Well-Liked 'Climate Depot' Editor Personally Attacked By Gore Supporter; Louisiana Partisan Becomes 'Unhinged'
Read here.
Committee Dems Reject Job Loss Cap (and what does this say about the party in power?) — MasterResource
Yesterday, on a strict party-line vote (34 Nay, 21 Yea), Democrats on the House Energy and Commerce Committee defeated Rep. Fred Upton’s (R-MI) amendment to protect workers from potential job losses due to the Waxman-Markey legislation.Joyeux Anniversaire! - Chris Horner - Planet Gore on National Review Online
Greg Garrison of Indy's WIBC just brought to my attention that yesterday's announcement — that Americans would finally be forced into driving the cars that Europeans, for their own reasons of envy and pique, demand we drive — came almost precisely a year to the day after then-candidate Barack Obama lectured us that we can't just drive the cars we want (like he does), eat what we want (like he does), and set our thermostats at "orchid" and just have other countries say that's ok. "That's not leadership. That's not going to happen," he added.Morning Bell: The Waxman-Markey Pay to Play » The Foundry
What does this have to do with the Waxman-Markey cap and trade legislation currently being debated in Congress? Everything. In order to win enough votes to pass cap and trade, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) has given the corporate members of the United States Climate Action Partnership (which includes both private and government-controlled firms like General Electric, Duke energy, Chrysler, and General Motors) a front-row seat in writing the legislation. The motives of these major corporations are simple: if they cooperate with big government in drafting the legislation, they can cut deals to protect their bottom line. If they don’t play ball, then big government will just tilt the regulatory scheme in their competitors favor. As the New York Times reports, this is exactly what is happening in the House now: [Via The Chilling Effect]
Rep. Barton Argues CO2 Shouldn’t be regulated because it is in Coca Cola | Politicususa.com
[Barton] “I would also point out that CO2, carbon dioxide, is not a pollutant in any normal definition of the term. … I am creating it as I talk to you. It’s in your Coca-Cola, you’re Dr. Pepper, your Perrier water. It is necessary for human life. It is odorless, colorless, tasteless, does not cause cancer, does not cause asthma. There is nobody who has ever been admitted to the hospital for CO2 poisoning, so it is not a pollutant. “Son of Waxman-Markey: Why More Politics Makes for a More Costly Cap and Trade Bill » The Foundry
Barton also went on to discuss the theory of climate change, – “If you think greenhouse gases are bad, life couldn’t exist without greenhouse gases. … So, there is a, there is a climate theory — and it’s a theory, it’s not a fact, it’s never been proven — that increasing concentrations of CO2 in the upper atmosphere somehow interact to trap more heat than the atmosphere would otherwise.”
Of course Barton’s argument ignores that nobody is disputing that CO2 isn’t a pollutant. It is not the CO2 itself that causes the problem. The climate change occurs based on high concentrations of carbon dioxide, which is something, that the deniers like Barton conveniently ignore. The high concentrations of CO2 do lead to more pollution, which leads to more people developing conditions like asthma.
• Compared to no cap and trade, real GDP losses increase an additional $2 trillion, from $7.4 trillion under the original draft to $9.6 trillion under the new draft;
• Compared to no cap and trade, average unemployment increases an additional 261,000 jobs, from 844,000 lost jobs under the original draft to 1,105,000 lost jobs under the new draft; and
• Peak-year unemployment losses rise by 500,000 jobs, from 2 million under the original draft to 2.5 million under the new draft.
On Page 781 | GlobalWarming.org
On Page 781 of Waxman Cap-and-Tax Bill, a Response Guide for Mass UnemploymentTwitter / Kate Sheppard
Beneficiaries to receive 3 years of salary, health insurance, job training, and relocation package as a result of this job-killing measure
Scalise: "We're creating the global warming police ... a global warming gestapo" by requiring home energy efficiency measures.Cap-and-Trade Delusions: Proponents need to stop pretending cap-and-trade will cost nothing and create tons of jobs. - Reason Magazine
Proponents need to stop pretending cap-and-trade will cost nothing and create tons of jobs.
BBC NEWS | Health | Officials issue heatwave advice
The Met Office says it is too early to tell whether it will be a very hot summer this year, but the signs so far are that it will be warmer than our last two summers and conditions could well trigger its heatwave warning system.YouTube [tip from a reader]- Good clip from CEI with Sam Kazman against a studio full of naive Climate revival disciples
Competitive Enterprise Institute General Counsel Sam Kazman debates the impact of President Obama's proposed new regulations on car mileage restrictions.
Finding ways of dealing with the consequences of climate change | Education | The Guardian
Changing behaviour will be as vital as new technologies in tackling climate change. So where is the funding for linguists, anthropologists and sociologists? Tariq Tahir reportsOpposing Views: OPINION: Cap and Trade for Dummies - What Everyone Should Know
...That means those “free” permits to industry would cost taxpayers approximately $55 billion in the first year alone. (Given these provisions, it’s not surprising that many environmental groups have recently pulled their support of the bill.)
Are You Now or Have You Ever Been a Member of the Creationist Party? - Edward John Craig - Planet Gore on National Review Online
In case you missed it: a revealing performance yesterday by "global warming believers" Chris Matthews and Jim Moran (D., VA), who hurl derision at Dana Rohrbacher (R., Calif.) over his lack of scientific sophistication, then run for cover under "the world's scientists all agree" when pressed on a few climate-science questions.Too Many Lobbyist Hands in the Cap and Trade Cookie Jar » The Foundry
Matthews again resorts to his now signature (for lack of a better word) argument: "Are you a creationist?"
Rohrbacher handles them readily.
Special interest politics have always been a part of politics and it’s unlikely to stop any time soon. Milton Friedman’s son explains it nicely:
“Special interest politics is a simple game. A hundred people sit in a circle, each with his pocket full of pennies. A politician walks around the outside of the circle, taking a penny from each person. No one minds; who cares about a penny? When he has gotten all the way around the circle, the politician throws fifty cents down in front of one person, who is overjoyed at the unexpected windfall. The process is repeated, ending with a different person. After a hundred rounds everyone is a hundred cents poorer, fifty cents richer, and happy.”
In this case, the ‘pennies’ are taken from the American taxpayer, and in return they are hit with higher energy prices, job losses, income cuts, and a sharp left turn toward big government.
Matthews to Congressman Over Global Warming Skepticism: ‘Are You a Luddite, a Trogloadyte?’ | Latest Technology News - Business News And Expert Advice
When examination of the science is too much work for show preparation and taking a position that falls in line with like-minded ideologues is part of your shtick, you can always resort to ad hominem attacks if needed.The Waxman-Markey Global Warming Tax » The Foundry
In a May 19 segment on his "Hardball" program about global warming, MSNBC’s Chris Matthews interviewed Reps. Jim Moran, D-Va., and Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif., who had opposing views on the issue. However, Matthews attacked Rohrabacher, a global warming skeptic, as someone ignorant of science.
"Congressman Rohrabacher, are you a Luddite, a troglodyte? Are you a part of ‘The Planet of the Apes’ that doesn’t want science? Where would you place yourself in this argument?" Matthews asked.
And What Do We Get After We Tax the Weather?
* The Ultimate Outsourcing: India and China have repeatedly said they would not match U.S. environmental goals in order to protect their economies. Cap and trade will merely move manufacturing jobs to China and India.
* Environmental Status Quo: All of the outrageous costs associated with this bill may at best result in 0.2 degree drop in temperature by the end of the century, and most likely even less.
* Massive Corruption: The New York Times reports that cap and trade “is almost perfectly designed for the buying and selling of political support through the granting of valuable emissions permits to favor specific industries and even specific congressional districts” (May 20, 2009).
It takes nine hours just to speed-read it?
Need for Speed (Read) to Pass Climate [Hoax] Bill - WSJ.com
WASHINGTON -- Democrats in the House Energy and Commerce Committee have taken a novel precaution to head off Republican efforts to slow action this week on a sweeping climate bill. They are hiring a speed reader.
Republicans on the committee have said they may force the reading of the entire 946-page bill -- as well as major amendments that measure several hundred pages -- all aloud. This is a procedure lawmakers have a right to invoke. Republicans are largely against the bill, which aims to cut emissions of so-called greenhouse gases by more than 80% over the next half-century but would be costly.
...
"Judging by the size of the amendments, I can read a page about every 34 seconds," said the newly hired staff assistant, who declined to give his name. Based on that estimate, it would take him about nine hours.
Thick as Thieves - Edward John Craig - Planet Gore on National Review Online
So of the 16 members of Obama’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board, only one (Martin Feldstein) opposes cap-and-trade. At least six expect direct financial benefits from cap-and-trade. The remaining members are either Obama supporters or union representatives. Taxpayers, consumers and non-rent-seeking businesses have been left out in the cold.
More breathtakingly stupid climate fraud
YouTube - It's getting hot in here. Dance girl, dance.
This video has been made for Oxfam GB as part of the YouTube Cannes Young Lions Ad Contest.
Climate Change Fraud - Because the debate is not over - Cooling off on Warming
As the poll also shows, in a question that got relatively little attention, only 54 percent of the 69 percent -- or 37 percent -- believe warming is caused solely by "people's behavior."
Honest headlines should read: "Nearly two-thirds of Americans don't believe the government is justified in trying to stop global warming."
Business [swindlers] press Obama on energy plan - Washington Times
"We're in the race, but we're not at the head of the race," said John Doerr, a venture capitalist with an interest in green jobs, at a meeting with Mr. Obama at the White House.Bracket Time for Climate [Fraud] {Treaty}{Pact} - Dot Earth Blog - NYTimes.com
The president, for his part, acknowledged that his own plan to fight global warming is too difficult "politically" for many on Capitol Hill, and he signaled he is open to the bill making its way through Congress that accommodates regional needs by giving some businesses rights to emit greenhouse gases.
Mr. Obama's Economic Recovery Advisory Board met for the first time and instantly ran into its first disagreement, with members putting off a vote on adopting a statement on how to go about creating green jobs and calling for action to combat global warming.
I hate to quibble, but shouldn't the sign have read "CO kills?"
Members of the public found his fume-filled car and tried to get him out, but he had died from carbon monoxide poisoning.APNewsNow: Tenn Senate delays ’cap and trade’ measure | jacksonsun.com |
The inquest heard his signs read: "Danger. Do not enter at any cost. CO2 kills." Police found a notice detailing the names of next of kin.
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — The state Senate has delayed voting on a resolution declaring that Tennessee won’t participate in a federal system for limiting greenhouse gas emissions.House panel to ok climate change [swindle] bill-Reuters "poll"
Republican Sen. Jack Johnson of Brentwood, the resolution’s main sponsor, has said the cap-and-trade system being debated in Congress would serve as a ‘‘hidden tax’’ on energy consumers.
Of the 59 members on the House committee, Reuters found that 30 lawmakers, all of them Democrats, would definitely vote "yes" or were likely to support the bill. The survey results were based on comments from the lawmakers themselves or from congressional staff on where their bosses stand on the bill.
There are 36 Democrats and 23 Republicans on the committee.
Man reportedly took school's solar panels to buy drugs - Chico Enterprise Record
OROVILLE -- A man who took dozens of solar panels from the roof of a Chico school stole them to buy drugs, according to his attorney.Can we prevent global warming by meditating? - One City: A Buddhist Blog for Everyone
...in that work, we talk about how meditation practice is something that can be part of our work towards changing the world that we live in, including government policies. How do you think that mindfulness and meditation practice can tilt the odds in favor of effective policy action needed to help slow global warming?But of course: "Global Warming May Result In Cooling Of Southeastern US"
The researchers estimated that the cooling effect from the aerosol haze over this region in summer is outpacing the warming effect from carbon dioxide emissions by 2-to-1 in a negative feedback system.2008: Global warming may raise kidney stone cases: study | Environment | Reuters
Kidney stones currently are most common in the southeastern United States, but this "kidney stone belt" is forecast to grow to the northward and westward, the researchers wrote in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Michigan scientists push legislation to fix climate change | Freep.com | Detroit Free Press
“We came together as scientists to urge them to move forward,” said Tom Dietz, director of the Environmental Science and Policy Program at Michigan State University, in a news conference today.
Dietz said a study nine years ago looked at the effects of future climate change on Michigan and the Great Lakes. The study showed lake levels are likely to drop, hurting tourism; agricultural crops like tart cherries will be affected; and storms and heat waves are likely to increase. Despite that study, there are still no meaningful policies to address climate change, he said.
Climate change [swindle] bill bogs down in House committee | Business | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle
...Democrats said it was important for the U.S. to take a lead role in limiting emissions — in the hopes that other countries would follow.
The Associated Press: ND regulators oppose 'cap and trade' carbon rules
"The problem with cap-and-trade is, it's really not ... an environmental policy. It's an appropriations policy. It's a way to raise money for government," Clark said. "And the way that it's proposed to be implemented raises it disproportionally from states like North Dakota."Writer/Reality denier Chris Mooney: The Deniers’ Last Stand
Clark said increased federal subsidies for research into cutting carbon dioxide emissions would be preferable to a cap-and-trade plan.
A coalition of farm groups, including the North Dakota Farm Bureau, the Stockmen's Association and the Grain Growers Association, sent a letter to North Dakota's congressional delegation and Gov. John Hoeven this week, questioning the effect of global warming legislation on the costs of fuel, fertilizer and electricity.
Once a law passes, meanwhile, there will be no reason any longer even to discuss whether global warming is real and human caused. The decision will have been made at the level of policy. Many folks will take their denial to the grave, of course. But with Congress having decided the matter, and a new set of greenhouse gas regulations instituted, denial will cease to serve any political purpose–and this, of course, was long its lifeblood, its raison d’etre.Cold May days on a sub-tropical barrier island aren't right | Jacksonville.com
Deprived of that animating energy, I suspect climate change denial will then finally take its place in the annals of politically irrelevant crankery, alongside ozone depletion denial, smoking-disease denial, asbestos-mesothelioma denial, and so on.
Perhaps someone ought to build a museum–a monument to human tenacity in the face of the truth–and memorialize them all there.
ST. SIMONS ISLAND, Ga. - Shouldn't somebody be playing football?
For the second day in a row Tuesday, the thermometer didn't make it past 60 degrees on this - as it is often described - subtropical barrier island. That temperature is Fahrenheit by the way. I'm thinking it's more of a sub-arctic barrier island.
Here we are listening to people on TV crying about climate change, global warming and sustainability and I'm freezing. I'm for getting to a daytime high around 72 degrees and sustaining that for awhile.
Jan '08: Low Water Levels in Lake Huron: The Global Warming Connection
Toronto - Scientists in Michigan presented evidence this weekend that suggests lower water levels in Lake Huron and Lake Michigan are part of a 30-year decline in water levels that is consistent with many climate change projections.Now: Water levels on Lake Michigan, Huron a foot higher than last year
Lakes Michigan and Huron have risen 12 inches compared to this time last year.
The lakes, which are connected by the Straits of Mackinac, also are 7 inches higher than a month ago, on April 15, according to the latest forecast from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Deepak Chopra: Is it morning in the world?
The Cold War is definitively over. The mood of the world is against bullying superpowers and for nuclear disarmament. These trends may be new and fragile, but the tide seems to have turned. It has also turned against deniers of climate change and opponents of environmentalism.Banned in Louisiana! State official irate Climate Depot allowed to testify at hearing | Climate Depot
Morano note: In addition to providing comic relief, Campbell's angry rants are quite chilling. As the science behind man-made global warming fears utterly collapses, many of the biggest promoters of the theory are growing increasingly desperate.
Bravo, Dana Rohrabacher
Don't miss this: YouTube - Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) Rep Jim Moran (D-VA) Debate Global Warming
[With idiot/believer Chris Matthews on Hardball]
[Morano's] Global warming presentation prompts Foster Campbell to ask for PSC testimony under oath - NOLA.com
After a presenter at last week's Public Service Commission meeting asserted that global warming is a hoax, Commissioner Foster Campbell said Tuesday he plans to introduce a motion at the June meeting requiring most people testifying before the commission to do so under oath.Newsmax.com - Cap and Trade Demonizes the Air We Breathe
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Campbell maintains that Dismukes offered the commission an analysis of a proposed policy change while Morano, who once worked for Rush Limbaugh, delivered a political rant that was of no value to the commission. He criticized Boissiere for not shutting down Morano's presentation.
"The testimony was taken like this guy was a credible witness," Campbell said. "I was waiting for the chairman to say, 'Hey, wait a minute, we need to talk about facts.' "
In his celebrated novel "1984," George Orwell wrote about Emmanuel Goldstein, a despicable and fictional enemy of the people created by the state to justify the perpetual war against an imaginary enemy being waged as a device to justify its Draconian dictatorship.
There's a new Emmanuel Goldstein in the process of being created by congressional Democrats and the Obama administration to frighten Americans into accepting a measure that would impose crippling economic costs on the American people. It's called CO2, and unlike Goldstein, it's real and omnipresent.
CNSNews.com - ‘Climate Change’ Is the Terrorist the U.S. Should Be Fighting, Muslim Leader Says
Among the dozens of people offering comments on Monday, one Muslim leader claimed that the war on terror is “really a euphemism” for the battle to control the world’s oil supply.Remember all those times we used military force to rob oil from Canada and Mexico? Me neither
Imam Johari Abdul-Malik, the director of outreach at the Dar Al-Hijrah Islamic Center in Virginia and the head of government relations for the Muslim Alliance of North America, told EPA officials his comments might be upsetting to some.
“I believe sometimes the war on terror is really a euphemism for the wars for oil and natural gas,” Abdul-Malik said at the all-day comment session held at EPA headquarters in Arlington. “Maybe if it were the Hindus who had oil under their feet there would be Hindu fundamentalists and extremists.”
The top sources of US crude oil imports for February were Canada (1.913 million barrels per day), Mexico (1.219 million barrels per day), Saudi Arabia (1.099 million barrels per day), Venezuela (0.960 million barrels per day), and Angola (0.671 million barrels per day).
Snow flying in Alberta: [Cheer up - At least the days will still be getting longer for a few more weeks]
EDMONTON - Flowers and shrubs wilted under wet snow Tuesday in Alberta as the temperature in the provincial capital at one point hovered around freezing - just one degree warmer than the Arctic community of Iqaluit.McCain Abruptly Flips On Climate Change Legislation
It was another bleak day after most of the Prairies shivered through a miserable long weekend.
Sen. John McCain now appears to oppose climate-change legislation, an abrupt switch that could seriously threaten any movement on such a bill.Scrapbook: Report from the 1st EPA Global Warming Endangerment Hearing
"Nearly 1000 page Climate Change legislation -- appears to be a cap & tax bill that I won't support," McCain wrote in a Twitter message Monday, a reversal of the position he took on the Senate floor in March.
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"Let me just say to my colleagues, I'm proud of my record on climate change," McCain said in March. "I've been all over the world and I've seen climate change, and I know it's real, and I'll be glad to continue this debate with my colleagues and people who don't agree with that."
I had the pleasure of attending much of yesterday's first public hearing from the Environmental Protection Agency on its global warming endangerment finding. This hearing was held at the EPA office in Arlington, VA, and featured a great crowd of people who want the EPA to do the right thing and regulate global warming pollution.
While I only saw the speakers from the hearing's start at 9am until noon, it featured a good variety of people from all types of backgrounds. There were many activists and staffers from the Sierra Club, as well as from many other environmental organizations. There were state environmental employees, faith leaders, business leaders, professors, scientists, doctors, and more - almost all of which were on our side.
Green-jobs evangelist sells Obama's ambitious plans - ContraCostaTimes.com
Obama has lured the 40-year-old [Van] Jones into his administration to work on clean-energy issues and become a major spokesman for the president's energy policies. Jones was given the unwieldy title "special adviser for green jobs, enterprise and innovation."
...He will also be a highly visible point person for Obama's energy plans, including a mandatory cap on carbon emissions.
A dynamic speaker, Jones is equally at home on a black radio station, "Larry King Live" or Comedy Central's "The Colbert Report," where he disputed host Stephen Colbert's notion that pursuing green jobs was as realistic as "herding unicorns."
He doesn't think it's a pipe dream to combine "greening the ghetto" with fighting global warming. He rejects warnings from some economists that new jobs in the solar and wind industries won't be enough to make up for losses in a declining coal industry.
...
Two years ago, Jones wrote that "we are witnessing the slow death of the Earth-devouring, suicidal version of capitalism," and the birth of "eco-capitalism." Now he meets with leaders of major industries, "not just the usual liberal suspects," and listens to their "special needs."
TheHill.com - House Energy panel slow getting started on climate measure
The House Energy and Commerce Committee on Tuesday got off to what can only be described as a glacial pace in marking up the Democratic climate change bill.
With as many as 400 Republican amendments up for introduction, the committee had fully considered only five amendments to the bill as of press time.
...
Waxman said Tuesday he anticipates the amendment process to “speed up” and stuck by his prediction that the committee will hold a vote to approve the bill and report it out of committee by Thursday.
“We’re just going to keep going,” Waxman said, without specifying how long into the night they will work or how often they intend to break.
The ranking Republican on the panel, Rep. Joe Barton (Texas), laughed off a Thursday finish.
“He’s dreaming,” Barton said. “It ain’t going to happen.”
Blue Dog Dem Getting Fed Up | GlobalWarming.org
“This bill is to the left of Barack Obama,” [Arkansas Democratic Rep. Mike] Ross said, adding that it could get worse during the final mark up.The Center for Political Cover | GlobalWarming.org
That said, he predicts the controversial legislation will clear the committee and pass the full House, although without his support. And then he believes the legislation will go to the U.S. Senate and die.
The Left is clearly terrified that their global warming con is sinking fast. Every new poll that’s come out this year on global warming and raising energy taxes shows more skepticism from Americans than the previous one. Environmental socialism, indeed.Transcript: The biggest and worst - FP Comment
Statement by Myron Ebell, Competitive Enterprise Institute director of Energy and Global Warming Policy, on the 900-page Congressional plan — advanced by Senator Henry Waxmawn and Congressman Ed Markey, to impose cap-and-trade carbon emission controls on the U.S. economy:
The Waxman-Markey bill would set many records: the biggest tax increase in history; the biggest government intervention in people’s lives since the Second World War; the biggest transfer of wealth from consumers to special interests in American history; and the biggest opportunity for corruption and manipulation by Wall Street traders ever created. It would cause consumer energy prices to go up relentlessly for decades, create some jobs while destroying millions of jobs, and produce perpetual economic stagnation.
THE CAP-AND-TRADE SCAM - Nealz Nuze on boortz.com
The Democrats are working out the details of a massive wealth redistribution bill, all in the name of climate change. This is the liberal nirvana. You take a naturally recurring climatological phenomena and use scare tactics to stampede the great unwashed into supporting your tax and spend schemes. The looter's plan to limit greenhouse gases are not in the name of sound environmental science but in the name of more government.Irrational? Get Used to It - Henry Payne - Planet Gore on National Review Online
— Anticipating the government mandate, Ford is crowing about making less profit. You read that right. This month, the company boasted about converting its Warren plant from producing SUVs to small Ford Focuses. The plant was once Ford’s most profitable, producing trucks generating at least $5,000 per vehicle. The Focus will make $1,500 per vehicle at best. Hooray?Waxman-Markey Markup: Day 2 | GlobalWarming.org
Americas’ personal transportation market is no longer governed by consumer choice but by government edict. Consumers don’t rank fuel efficiency (just 16 percent of U.S vehicle sales are small cars) or global warming as high priorities. But Washington Democrats do.
To explain the inevitable contortions this clash of government and consumer choices will engender, get used to lots of irrationality.
The only highlight from day one was the opening statement of Rep. John Barrow (D-Georgia), which seemed to indicate that he will oppose this expensive energy bill. He becomes the first Democrat on the Committee to do so. Hopefully, he is not the last. Reps. Eliot Engel (D-New York) and Charlie Melancon (D-Lousiana) seemed to hedge. They are likely holding out for more booty from Waxman.
CAFE Obama: Proposed mileage standards would kill more Americans than Iraq War « Green Hell Blog
The Obama administration’s proposed mileage standards that will be announced today may kill more Americans at a faster rate than the Iraq War — his signature issue in the 2008 presidential campaign.Committee on Energy and Commerce, Republicans : Press Release :: Q. It’ll Cost How Much? A. Sorry, That’s Unknowable
U.S. Rep. Cliff Stearns, R-Florida: Just as a question, how much money do you think this is going to take? Based upon your argument that the appropriators can appropriate more money if necessary, is there anybody in this room who knows how much we’re talking about here?
Gordon: I don’t think anybody can answer that until you get further down the road.
Stearns: Well, can you ballpark it? Are we talking about half a billion? I would think somebody in this room with this amendment could at least give us an idea of what we’re talking about.
Gordon: There are going to be transformational types of energy that we can’t think of now.
No offense, but would it be prudent to cough up $45 trillion every time some idiot tweaks some bogus model?
Global warming could be twice as bad as forecast | Reuters
Earth's median surface temperature could rise 9.3 degrees F (5.2 degrees C) by 2100, the scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found, compared to a 2003 study that projected a median temperature increase of 4.3 degrees F (2.4 degrees C).
The new study, published in the American Meteorological Society's Journal of Climate, said the difference in projection was due to improved economic modeling and newer economic data than in previous scenarios.
...
These projections indicate that "without rapid and massive action," this dramatic warming will take place this century, the statement said.
Government Regulates to the Mean, Plus More on Hidden Taxes | Coyote Blog
So why not a carbon tax? Well, the politicians have all explained this pretty directly — because they do not want to pay the political cost of raising taxes, particularly on something like gas whose price gets so much media attention. Having demagogued oil companies as evil for so many years for raising gas prices, politicians were not able to bear the irony of themselves being responsible for higher gas prices.Guy who formerly pretended to be fictional hero promotes non-solution to fictional "problem"!
So instead, they will force cars to be built more fuel efficiently, which will almost certainly raise the price of cars (as well as reduce choice and certain features). These higher costs and reductions in choice are most certainly a tax on consumers, but they are an indirect tax. They show up as rising prices and perhaps falling attractiveness of auto makers’ product lines, which consumers will blame on auto makers, not the Congress or Obama.
So Obama will continue to say he has never raised taxes on the middle class, when in fact he has just made their cars $1500 more expensive. Some day, we may live in a world where politicians are called to task for this kind of bait and switch, but my guess is that Obama gets away with it.
As Washington fluttered with climate change action yesterday, actor and environmental campaigner Pierce Brosnan added some star power to a public hearing at the Environmental Protection Agency about greenhouse gas emissions. But Brosnan said nothing about the hearing's topic, the endangerment finding that could mean regulations over emissions sources under the Clean Air Act. Instead, he praised Washington's alternate approach to climate change, the Waxman-Markey bill, which is getting a (slow) mark-up on Capitol Hill this week. Video below...
FT.com / Comment / Editorial - Cap and trade or coach and horses
...Predictably, in the disbursement of this enormous windfall gain, the House proposes to reward favourites, such as regulated utilities, and punish villains, notably the oil companies. Some emitters will receive more permits in relation to their needs than others. This would create a perpetual struggle for political advantage. If you wanted to promote corruption, this would be a good way.Al's Journal [O' Fraud]: An Important Week
Still not content, the House wants to set conditions on its gifts of permits – including commitments to shield consumers from higher energy costs. Yet the whole point of this exercise is to make high-carbon energy dearer. On the drawing board is a vast and unfathomably complex new system, which fosters corruption, raises little revenue and tries to suppress the incentives that are its entire purpose. Otherwise, it all looks quite promising.
This is a pivotal week in our fight against the climate crisis. The Energy and Commerce Committee will be voting on the Waxman-Markey bill, which is one of the most important pieces of legislation ever to be introduced in Congress. As I stated during my testimony several weeks ago, this legislation has the moral significance equivalent to that of the civil rights legislation of the 1960’s and the Marshall Plan of the late 1940’s.Women, your [climate huckster] needs you | smh.com.au
WOMEN hold the answer to cutting Australia's greenhouse gas emissions, according to a new campaign which aims to echo the women's movement of the 1970s and harness female power to fight climate change.
The plan may provide an antidote to male apathy: polls show fewer men are excited by the issue.
SF Environmental Policy Examiner: Global warming and the fierce hypocrisy of here
The problem is that we are here, trying to decide what is best for people in some undetermined 'there.' These people can decide for themselves. They need to be freed from crippling debt brought on by dictators (yes, that still exists) and be given a voice in determining their future. They do need help. But they don't need to be patronized.House panel to begin debating climate change bill | Politics | Reuters
Can you tell I'm a bit annoyed?
Joe Barton, the senior Republican on the committee, warned Waxman: "You are about to embark on an episode of putting the entire American economy, which is the world's largest, through an absolute economic wringer."Powering Prisons with Windmills - News- msnbc.com
From the "Ummm, really?" category: State Rep. Mary Fritz and five of her colleagues are hoping that throwing wind turbines up on state correctional property (read: jails) would generate enough power to not only fuel the prison but give some back to the nearby community.
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Don't get us wrong -- it's a great idea. We're all about saving the environment. But perhaps the economics aren't quite there yet. And we're a little more in favor of the state not going bankrupt.
(And we won't even get into how many trees came down to print the bill.)
The American Wind Energy Association points out that a small wind generator won't even handle lighting an exit sign. Now we're not that good at measuring kWh's, but on the lower end, it seems an array could cost tens of thousands of dollars and may not generate that much actual power.
So we might get cooler instead? | Herald Sun Andrew Bolt Blog
No kidding:“30 years ago…I had a front-row seat as another president’s ambitious plans to transform America’s energy economy crashed & burned. I suspect that today’s…bureaucrats will witness a similar debacle.” | GORE LIEDTHE accuracy of Australian climate forecasting could fall unless the Bureau of Meteorology is given more funding for super computers, researchers say. The bureau has warned that its long-term climate forecast capability may have peaked and could even have started to decline.You mean, the bureau might be seeing warming in an Antarctic that’s actually cooling? Or predict dry when it actually floods?
Ron Bailey’s closing line in is essay on the prospects of the latest round of government efforts to pick winners: “Thirty years ago, as a young energy regulator, I had a front-row seat as another president’s ambitious plans to transform America’s energy economy crashed and burned. I suspect that today’s eager young bureaucrats will witness a similar debacle.”
Roger’s Rules » Will Nancy Pelosi be Flying Commercial Again Soon?
The world awaits the answer to this pressing question. Although Madam Speaker has little time for the U.S. military, we all know how much she likes to avail herself of its aircraft when traveling from point A (California, say) to point B (Washington, D.C.). It costs the taxpayers a bundle, but, hey, what are taxpayers for if not to keep their leaders living in the style to which they’ve become, or would like to become, accustomed?Works and Days » Doing Penance
But will hoi polloi soon be welcoming her back in the airport security lines please-remove-your-shoes-and-jacket-m’am? Who knows?
Words and Deeds?
This is a very strange time, in which loud public protestations of liberal morality are supposed to suspend memory itself-and override all past and current behavior.
We are in a sort of medieval mode in which the suspect wine-bibbing, fornicating priest cleverly launches a general inquisition against the use of alcohol and sex to escape scrutiny. As a general rule of thumb, the more one hears or reads about a fanatically angry official or pundit on a moral crusade, the more likely they were involved in just the sort of behavior they are railing against. We saw this on the Republican side with a Larry Craig, Duke Cunningham, and Mark Foley, but the liberal establishment has taken it to new heights.
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Money Really Is Green
Al Gore is angry at the recent Cheney appearances. Fair enough-but oddly he objects to the idea of a Vice President emeritus entering the public fray. But if anyone were to collate Cheney’s public appearances with Al Gore’s frenzied attacks against Bush in 2002-3-when he almost seemed rabid in front of the cameras, screaming slurs and accusations of lying-then Cheney seems the paragon of sobriety. Meanwhile the media suggests at every occasion that Cheney was a Halliburton pawn, but I would be willing to bet that the net worth of Al Gore from his various entrepreneurial activities, meshed with and predicated upon his vehement advocacy of global warming and substantial government contacts and relationships, have made Gore both the wealthier man, and the more ethically suspect. After all, he wants the nation to embark on a radical agenda of green promotion-which thus far has turned Gore into a capitalist worth over $100 million.
IPCC flu needs curing, too | Herald Sun Andrew Bolt Blog
If only the UN’s climate change alarmists at the IPCC were challenged the way the UN’s health alarmists at WHO areObama to Set New Vehicle Rules, First Carbon [Scam] Limit (Update3) - Bloomberg.com
May 18 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama will announce new vehicle-emission rules tomorrow, setting the first-ever nationwide limit on greenhouse-gas pollution from autos, people familiar with the plan said.
Skeptic's Corner: Skeptics From Around the Globe
Frank J. Tipler-Professor of Mathematical Physics, astrophysics, Tulane University,American Thinker: I wish I were a liberal
"Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) is a scam, with no basis in science....
....It is obvious that anthropogenic global warming is not science at all, because a scientific theory makes non-obvious predictions which are then compared with observations that the average person can check for himself. As we both know from our own observations, AGW theory has spectacularly failed to do this. The theory has predicted steadily increasing global temperatures, and this has been refuted by experience. NOW the global warmers claim that the Earth will enter a cooling period. In other words, whether the ice caps melt, or expand --- whatever happens --- the AGW theorists claim it confirms their theory. A perfect example of a pseudo-science like astrology."
I'd have to immediately quit smoking, in public at least. I'd be required to agree that global warming is real and man is the cause. Even though the earth has cooled in the last decade, everyone knows its still getting warmer.A comment on Paul Krugman's piece
TDK said...
It beggars belief that we are expected to believe that a government (China) that can't be trusted to tax businesses without cutting secret deals wouldn't cheat with carbon permits.
Your mainstream media on drugs?: Bizarro world: Wash Post claims public wants climate action and 'Scientists around the globe have rejected' skeptics points
Skeptics of Global Warming Have Their Say on Capitol Hill
After the decade they've had, Capitol Hill's climate-change skeptics might well feel like polar bears on a shrinking ice floe.Regarding public opinion on the global warming farce, has the Post's Fahrenthold really not seen these polls?!
Scientists around the globe have rejected their main arguments -- that the climate isn't clearly warming, that humans aren't responsible for it, or that the whole thing doesn't amount to a problem. Public opinion has also shifted and even Exxon Mobil talks about greenhouse gases.
But this spring, it's been obvious: Doubt is not dead. [Via Climate Depot]
Monday, May 18, 2009
Global warming word games | Lorrie Goldstein | Columnists | Comment | Toronto Sun
Finally, my favourite, the "carbon offset" -- used by jet-setting politicians, environmentalists, UN delegates, movie stars, rock bands, professional athletes and other rich celebrities to claim all that flying and voracious energy consumption they're doing is "carbon neutral" because they're paying somebody else not to emit carbon dioxide in the future.10% of winter wheat crop killed
What would be the correct phrase describing carbon offsets, you ask?
That's easy: "Utter bulls--t."
A harsh winter has killed at least 10 per cent of the winter wheat crop in Ontario.
“That’s probably the worst we’ve seen in 15 years,” Peter Tuinema, manager of programs and policy with the Ontario Wheat Producers’ Marketing Board, said Friday.
Climate-bill foes likely to seize on CBO's scoring - Washington Times
Congress' chief scorekeeper says the global warming bill moving through Congress will either be scored as a major tax increase or a massive expansion of the federal government - and either one could give opponents substantial ammunition to complicate Democrats' efforts to pass a bill.Guest Column: The influence of the eco-Nazis
Also known as how truly bad science killed America's manufacturing economy.Indiana Planting Progress Continues well Behind
Planting progress of corn is about 16 days later than last year and 21 days behind the average pace while planting of soybeans is about 14 days later than last year and 20 days behind the 5-year average.Borenstein, March '08: Spring [allegedly] keeps coming earlier for birds, bees, trees - USATODAY.com
Satellites measuring when land turns green found that spring "green-up" is arriving eight hours earlier every year on average since 1982 north of the Mason-Dixon line.
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