Marx Comes to Durban

Timothy Birdnow

My father-in-law forwards this. It's a handy analysis of just who is behind the Durban charade, and what it is they seek.

http://www.eagleforum.org/un/2011/11-11-29.html

Canada to withdraw from Kyoto treaty

Dana Mathewson

Let's hear three loud cheers for our neighbor to the north! It's to be announced that they are withdrawing from the Kyoto treaty when it comes up for renewal.

http://www.urgentagenda.com/PERMALINKS%20VI/NOVEMBER%202011/28.CANADA.HTML

"[Environment Minister Peter] Kent said in the House of Commons on Nov. 22 he won't sign a document at the Durban conference that extends the Kyoto targets.


"Canada goes to Durban with a number of countries sharing the same objective, and that is to put Kyoto behind us," Kent said."

[...]

"Kent told The Canadian Press that the Kyoto Protocol is out of date because it excludes major emitters among developing nations, including China, India and Brazil.

"He also said that previous governments had failed to devise a strategy to hit the accord's targets.

"Those targets are now out of reach, and the Conservative government has set other, more modest targets while vowing to press the big polluters among developing nations to sign a deal with their own emissions-reduction targets."

END QUOTE

Now if only our administration would get that smart. Last I knew, we weren't signators to this, but I know our administration is in favor of Kyoto.

Dan Rather, Vietnam Vets, and a False History DVD at a School Near You

Jack Kemp

JOURNALIST’S NOTE:


The following article is largely based a Vietnam veterans’ book, “Stolen Valor” by B.G. Burkett and Glenna Whitley. Indeed, they are the ones who made this piece possible. I am just keeping the authors’ words alive in the public consciousness, if I may use a Sixties phrase. This article introduces (or re-introduces) the authors’ work to people who also lived through those times but may have forgotten some of the details – and perhaps a younger audience who doesn’t know this history or this 1998 book. The fact that is was published in Dallas by Verity Press, rather than by a big New York publishing house is more than coincidental. I am not receiving any financial or in-kind compensation for writing this article that, in fact, is a recommendation for “Stolen Valor.” This book has won the William E. Colby Award for Outstanding Military Book – and it is well deserved.
END

Dan Rather chose to go forward with poorly researched efforts in 2004 to discredit President George W. Bush’s service in the Air National Guard, the so called “Memogate” affair which cost him and several others their jobs at CBS. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,143871,00.html A small Alabama air base office with an outmoded typewriter was supposed to have produce a report with an elevated miniature “th,” a capability only available on an advanced IBM Selectric typewriter, as found in fancy big city offices at that time, was just one of amateurish claims that Dan Rather defended with his showcasing a “witness” who said (both to and for him) that the memos were “fake but true.”

But there was another brazen act of “fake but true” journalism” in Dan Rather’s past.

In 1998, the book “Stolen Valor: How the Vietnam Generation Was Robbed of its Heroes and its History” by B.G. Burkett and Glenna Whitley was published. Its fifth chapter was entitled “CBS Hits ‘The Wall Within’” and chronicled the 1988 television documentary hosted by Dan Rather. The program displayed interviews and spoke of the lives of six Vietnam veterans living in the Pacific Northwest. They were allegedly suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) due to their combat related service, with the heavy implication that Vietnam veterans contained a high amount of servicemen who suffered drug and alcohol addiction, committed many murders, had an inability to hold down a job, were homelessness, suffered despair, etc.

The book further states how this documentary became part everyone’s home and school life NOW as accepted “truth.” That means, in many cases, yours or your neighbor’s children. Page 90 states:


“The documentary was so acclaimed it became part of the CBS video history series on the Vietnam War. Dignified with a formal introduction by Walter Cronkite, once the nation’s premier war correspondent, the series sold for $150. Designated as official ‘history,’ marketed to schools and other institutions, the video now forever perpetuates the image of the Vietnam vet as a walking time bomb.”

END OF QUOTE

The problem was that the CBS documentary’s six veterans’ stories, after being investigated in detail by Burkett and Whitley, turned out to be either false or greatly distorted.

One serviceman shown was named “Steve” who supposedly became a Navy SEAL at age 16, fought behind enemy lines in Vietnam, mentally snapped and came home in a “straight jacket.” (page 88, “Stolen Valor”).

For added drama, Rather asked the following of Steve on camera (pages 88-89, “Stolen Valor”):

“You’re telling me that you went into the village, killed people, burned part of the village, then made it appear that the other side had done this?” Rather asked.

“Yeah.”

“For propaganda purposes at home.”

“That is correct.”
END OF QUOTE

Dan Rather had been a correspondent in Vietnam in 1965-1966. “He (Dan) had to know that there were no sixteen-year-old Navy SEALs in Vietnam or anywhere else. The minimum enlistment age is seventeen; in modern times, it is extremely difficult to enlist in the military without a valid birth certificate.” (Page 89, “Stolen Valor). And it takes two years of rigorous training to become a SEAL. It seems CBS was unthinkingly making up sensational statements as they went along.

CBS went to great effort to not reveal Steve’s last name, but Accuracy in Media, in condemning CBS portrayal of all Vietnam Vets as “tragedies,” also revealed a last name of “Barbe” for Steve. This lead to the book authors tracking down Steve’s ex-wife and her telling the authors her former husband had served under the last name of “Southards,” as well as sending the writers a copy of Steve’s DD-214 form (a government record showing service and separation from the military).

After filing a Freedom of Information request on Steve, this is what Burkett and Whitley found (page 93):

“But Southards was not a SEAL, nor had he taken any SEAL training. There had been no military trainers creating an “Eighteen-cent-an-hour assassin,” no participation in secret programs to murder Vietnamese civilians.

In reality, Southards was an ‘internal communications repairman,’ assigned to rear area bases, and had no combat decorations. His only special training was a ‘mootino picture operations course (16 mm),’ at Subic Bay in the Philippines. Southards did receive a Navy Unit Commendation Medal, as did all members of his unit…”

After his transfer to the Philippines, Southards spent several months in the brig for going AWOL six times. Little that Southards had told Rather was true except that he had been in the Navy and his first name was Steve.”
END OF QUOTE

One of the authors further notes that (page 94):

“The irony was inescapable. I, a rank amateur, had been able to verify with several phone calls and an FOIA request that the description Steve had given of his military service and his tales of atrocities was fraudulent. Before interviewing Southards, another producer had tried to verify his background and found his ex-wife, as I had. Apparently CBS, while meticulously preparing its trumpeted ‘return to the documentary’ for over a year, had made no effort to obtain Steve’s record independently.”
END OF QUOTE

Rather then told the story George Gruel, who witnessed a spinning propeller cut his close friend in half on the deck of the U.S.S. Ticonderoga. This had traumatized him, he said, giving him PTSD. There was also shown the story of Terry Bradley, “the fighting sergeant” who had “claimed to have skinned alive up to fifty Vietnamese men, women, even babies, in an hour…” (Page 89, “Stolen Valor”).

The authors first investigated the spelling “George Gruel” and found he was not on the Ticonderoga when this propeller accident/death occurred, nor was he listed as one of the twelve witnesses in the written report of the tragedy. There was no record of this spelling of his name even being in the Navy, but a 1994 Readers’ Digest article had the correct spelling of “George Greul,” something the “professionals at CBS” couldn’t ascertain. Greul had served on the U.S.S. Ticonderoga and received the Vietnam Service Medal – but no propeller accident had occurred while he was on the ship sometime within his Navy hitch between February 1969 and December, 1972.

“Greul told McConnell (the Readers’ Digest journalist) the death of his friend (by propeller) occurred between July and October 1971, when the ship was off the coast of Vietnam on ‘secret presidential orders’ to mine Haiphong Harbor. Greul verified that he had been declared 100 percent disabled by the psychological trauma the accident caused; he receives $1,952 a month in service-connected compensation payments from the VA. (page 95)”
END OF QUOTE

I’m no naval warfare expert, but who would send an aircraft carrier, huge and slow turning, into a harbor to lay mines? The authors found “the Ticonderoga had been converted to an anti-submarine warfare carrier in 1970, during Greul’s service. It is impossible to believe Greul’s story is true, in my opinion.

As for Terry Bradley, “the fighting sergeant,” his unit - the 25th Infantry Division - had served too close to Saigon for such an atrocity to go unreported, the book authors’ claim. And Bradley’s records show he was not a combat soldier, but an “ammo handler.” Having a pre-service record of mental problems, “In three-and-a-half years of service, Bradley spent three hundred days either AWOL or in the stockade.” (Page 94). In fact, Dan Rather may have been able to check on this story with his fellow CBS newsman Steve Croft, a 25th Infantry Vietnam veteran who worked for CBS’s news show “West 57th” in New York at that time.

The producers of this story, Paul and Holly Fine, had interviewed eighty-seven Vietnam veterans before they chose “the four of five saddest cases to put on film,” said Mrs. Sarah Lee Pilley, the wife of Marine lieutenant colonel “who had seen heavy combat in Vietnam. But they lost interest when they realized how successful he had become after the war.” (Pages 104-105).

Mrs. Pilley points out what was missing from Dan Rather’s documentary were any stories of Vietnam veterans who made a success of their lives after the war. Some of the other more famous Vietnam vets include former Secretary of State Alexander Haig, Dallas Cowboy quarterback Roger Staubach, actors Patrick Duffy, Steve Kanaly, Dennis Franz and Wheel of Fortune host Pat Sajak - all Vietnam veterans. Washington Post publisher Donald Graham, Post editor Lou Marano and foreign correspondent Herb Denton are also Vietnam veterans. (Page 69, Chapter 3 of “Stolen Valor”).

Walter Anderson, a Marine veteran who became editor of Parade Magazine. He wrote the book “The Confidence Course.” http://www.amazon.com/Confidence-Course-Seven-Steps-Self-Fulfillment/dp/0061094536/ref=sr_1_11?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1322492905&sr=1-11 Anderson came from a home where his father, an alcoholic who later died in an institution, beat him as a boy for trying to learn how to read (with the help of a black woman neighbor, a Columbia U. grad). The book title comes from his Marine basic training. Anderson also taught a version of his “Confidence Course at colleges and had a night class version (at the Learning Annex, if my memory serves me) in New York City where I privilege of being in his class for many weeks. He is anything but the image of a Vietnam vet that Dan Rather tried to portray on film.

What is left out here is the hundreds of thousands of Vietnam veterans whose names are recognizable only to their families and their communities where they have succeeded in building solid lives and contributing to America. You know, the type of people Dan Rather went out of his way NOT to find for his revisionist history television “documentary.”

The best conclusion to this piece comes from “Stolen Valor” authors B.G. Burkett and Glenna Whitley.

In a rare moment of truth - quoted on page 106 - Dan Rather, in a speech at the Radio and Television News Directors Association on September, 10th, 1993, said:

“He warned that other news organizations, including CBS, couldn’t rejoice over the “Dateline NBC” disaster, when NBC producers were caught using tiny rockets to fake a truck crash test. ‘it could happen to us,’ Rather said.
END QUOTE

It could happen to Dan Rather – and did twice – because what he described as pressure for ratings was really pressure for sensationalistic ratings that also supported a leftist worldview that “knew” Vietnam veterans were all very troubled individuals and therefore one shouldn’t go into the military. The net effect of this was fact checking on the level of a tabloid with a cover story claiming flying saucers hovered over Elvis Presley’s grave.

FINAL NOTE: The authors have a website, www.stolenvalor.com which has a form to “Report a Fake” (veteran or fake combat “hero”) and an investigative team.

Natural Air Conditioning for the Lazy, Hazy Days of Carbon

Timothy Birdnow

One of the unquestioned assumptions in the Global Warming, er, Climate Change, er, Climate Disruption and Flatulence Events, is that carbon dioxide heats the planet. This idea flows from fundamental physics (put CO2 in a jar with a thermometer and watch the mercury rise) and from observations of the planet Venus, which is hotter than the melting point of lead and hotter than the combustion temperature of wood. Venus should be warm but in the liquid-water range (and, in fact, likely once was under 200* F.) yet, thanks to huge amounts of carbon dioxide, the planet is a balmy 900* F. or so. This has led the majority of scientists to conclude that CO2 is a greenhouse gas.

But what exactly do we mean by the term? Any gas does not act in isolation - except in the bell jar experiment. It acts as part of a larger, more dynamic system. The atmosphere of Mars is 95% CO2, yet the planet is much COLDER than it should be, with most of the atmosphere frozen solid. Mars should have a climate similar to Sweden in many places, yet it is bitterly cold, with temperatures dropping below any of the worst parts of antarctica. This while the planet has an atmosphere composed primarily of that dreaded greenhouse gas carbon dioxide. How can this be?

There are huge differences between Venus, the Earth, and Mars. The Venusian atmosphere is almost entirely CO2, and it lost what water it once possessed to space. Venus barely rotates, with a day longer than it's year (a Venusian day is 243 Earth days, while a year is 224.7) which means you get bumpkis for a coriolis effect, meaning no rotating air masses, no hurricanes, no tornadoes, no squat for air movement. There is no moon, so Venus is subject solely to solar tides, which are of limited impact given the slow rotation. In short, Venus is like an anthill under a child's magnifying glass. It's going to be hot, hot, hot.

Mars, on the other hand, is so cold it cannot get a jump start. The atmosphere is frozen on the surface for much of the year, and when it finally warms it increases wind speed, picking up dust and dropping the planet's temperature back down. Mars suffers from too voluminous an atmosphere; it cannot get surface temperatures high enough. The atmosphere is voluminous because of the weaker Martian gravity. Even so, it belies the argument that CO2 is such a powerful driver of climate. Mars has water, too, but it is frozen into a rock most places, and will not come out. Mars has a decent rotation, but no major moon (Phobos and Deimos are little more than paltry asteroids) to create tides, too, which suggest that tidal forces may be vitally important to Earth's atmosphere. Oh, and Mars sits on the edge of the asteroid belt, and gets pelted by debris regularly. It is heavily cratered. Every major asteroid strike would knock dust into the sky, cooling planetary temperatures.

But Earth is unlike either of these worlds, and there is no reason to believe that CO2 operates the same as on either. Why should it? There is considerable mixing of gases, convections which make predicting Earthly weather extraordinarily difficult. There are tidal forces, for instance, unlike anyplace else. There is the Van Allan radiation belt, the result of the Earth's magnetic field. Venus rotates too slowly for a magnetic field, and Mars does not have a molten interior. We see the aurora in north and south, the effects of the solar wind visible to us mortals. This has got to have an effect on our climate, yet we do not have the foggiest idea. And let's not get started on Milankovitch Cycles...

Here is a paper that argues that, unlike on Venus, Earthly CO2 actually acts as a coolant.
http://www.tech-know.eu/uploads/JCao_N2O2GreenGases_Blog.pdf

Abstract:

There is a fallacy dominating the way of our thinking in current climate research
that radiative gases such as carbon dioxide and water vapour are regarded greenhouse gases
that trap heat and warm up the atmosphere. This article will show it is non-radiative nitrogen
and oxygen gases that award the Earth a warm liveable near surface atmosphere. Radiative
gases such as carbon dioxide are cooler than, gain heat by molecular collision from, and
dissipate heat by radiation for nitrogen and oxygen.

End abstract.

While the simple bell-jar experiment couldn't possibly work this way, why shouldn't we see things differently in the dynamic system that is the Earth's atmosphere? Remember; gases to not generate heat, merely absorb it. There is no such thing as cold, really, but rather the absence of heat, and an air conditioner works by moving heat from one place to another. If CO2 is so good at absorbing heat, why shouldn't it act as the freon in a giant air-conditioning system in our atmosphere, moving heat upward and dissipating it into space?

And that has been the crux of the argument over Global Warming; what are the natur of feedbacks, and how do they operate. The IPCC and other alarmists argue feedbacks are positive, creating a feedback loop that will drive the planetary temperatures ever higher. CO2, they argue, will warm the planet enough to trigger the evaporation of more water vapor, which will then trigger more CO2, which will then trigger the release of methane and other high-powered greenhouse gases, leading to more water vapor...

But our experience suggests otherwise; certainly Mars is stuck in a negative feedback rut (and a pity; it could be SETTLED by humans if it would ever come out of the eternal ice age). In fact, warming proceeds a rise in CO2 in the historical record - often by as much as 800 years (interestingly, we had a warm period 800 years ago called the Medieval Warming Period). Planetary temperatures have been stable since 1995, suggesting we may have peaked in our warming and are on the downslide despite rising CO2 levels (and who is to say those levels are truly caused by Man; we only assume that; we do not have actual industrial emissions measurements to prove the assumption). It may be the rise in CO2 is actually cooling the planet, and perhaps we will regret cutting emissions when an ice age hits?

The point is, we aren't willing to consider this in the slightest. There is a template, a narrative, and woe unto he who thinks outside of the carbon box. But science is the ultimate home of rebels, because the most cherished views are regularly overturned by those who refuse to conform to the "concensus", and the lone rebel is often proven right. We must think the unthinkable sometimes. Perhaps this silly fear of carbon should be reconsidered.

Maybe CO2 is an air-conditioner? Perhaps in twenty, thirty years we will be missing the lazy, hazy days of carbon?

Mooch's warning to gun owners

Dana Mathewson

In case you don't get Vision to America.. .

http://dailycaller.com/2011/10/11/michelle-obamas-warning-to-gun-owners/

"At a recent fundraiser for President Obama’s re-election campaign in Providence, Rhode Island, the first lady told her audience:

“We stand at a fundamental crossroads for our country. You’re here because you know that in just 13 months, we’re going to make a choice that will impact our lives for decades to come … let’s not forget what it meant when my husband appointed those two brilliant Supreme Court justices … let’s not forget the impact that their decisions will have on our lives for decades to come.”


"This was music to the ears of the small, affluent crowd of admirers who cheered and applauded. But to gun owners, Michelle Obama’s remarks should sound like a warning bell, alerting us to the danger ahead should Barack Obama win re-election and get the opportunity to alter the current make-up of the Supreme Court."


Elections have consequences, folks!

BBC and CRU

Timothy Birdnow

More evidence from the new Climategate e-mails proving the BBC was in cahoots with the Gang Green and alarmist scientists, particularly the Grand CRU.

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/tom-blumer/2011/11/27/latest-climategate-emails-bbc-cahoots-climategate-scientists

Oh, but "the science is settled" even while the scientists are busy "hiding the decline".


BBC? Stands for Bought Bullpucky Corporation.

The Still-Enduring Cult

Dana Mathewson

Stephen King's new Kennedy assassination novel attempts to get at the real meat, but falls victim to the myths.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/27/opinion/sunday/Douthat-The-Enduring-Cult-of-Kennedy.html?_r=1&ref=todayspaper

First, it presupposes that Kennedy was a very good president, and might have been a great one if he'd lived. Not so.

Another myth is that Kennedy would have kept us out of Vietnam, whereas he, more than anyone else, got it rolling; and it was his people who ran it under Johnson.

The third myth is that Kennedy was a martyr to "right-wing unreason" -- a strange accusation considering that Oswald was a leftist freak -- "a pro-Castro agitator whose other assassination target was the far-right segregationist Edwin Walker."

Good article -- I recommend it highly. Most of us are heartily tired of all things Kennedy. But as the author says, "This last example [assigning Kennedy's murder to right-wing hate] suggests why the J.F.K. cult matters — because its myths still shape how we interpret politics today. We confuse charisma with competence, rhetoric with results, celebrity with genuine achievement. We find convenient scapegoats for national tragedies, and let our personal icons escape the blame. And we imagine that the worst evils can be blamed exclusively on subterranean demons, rather than on the follies that often flow from fine words and high ideals.

Of Nazis and Nietzche

Timothy Birdnow

I've long argued that Nietzche and Schopenhaur were precursors to National Socialism (or, rather, were philosophical underpinnings that laid the foundation for Nazism). Our friend Mark Musser has gone me far better, writing an outstanding article for American Thinker illustrating that very fact.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/11/friedrich_nietzsche_his_proto-nazi_eco-fascism.html

Here is just a snippet:

"In Hitler's lesser-known second book called Secret Book, he wrote that though religious ascetics deny natural instinct, "[t]he fact of his own existence is already a refutation of his protest. Nothing that is made of flesh and blood can escape the laws which determined its coming into being. As soon as the human mind believes itself to be superior to them, it destroys that real substance which is the bearer of the mind." Such an amazing quotation from the Führer strongly reflects the existential influence of Nietzsche.

In the mid-1930s, Englishman Anthony Ludovici (1882-1971), an expert on Nietzsche and translator of many of his works, visited the Third Reich. Ludovici wrote glowingly of his visit to Nazi Germany. He gave his personal opinion on how much Nietzsche's influential philosophy could be witnessed in the new Germany. He even spoke of "Hitler's sincere and earnest admiration of Nietzsche's philosophy."

Ludovici was most impressed with the Nazi "back to the land" movement. The Nazis began setting up labor camps all over the Reich to help make Germany become more arable with a racist, local-only green farmer policy. Under the SS leadership of Heinrich Himmler (1900-1945) and Richard Walter Darre (1895-1953), the Nazis concocted a green racist collectivist program designed to re-ruralize Germany and thus root the economy into the soil of the homeland. They believed that this program would save Germany from the cultural degeneracy of the Jewified international city by developing a hearty and healthy people close to the land.

Ludovici said that the Nazis selected desirable people along strict biological lines to resettle the countryside. He pointed out that the Labor Service slowed down the great migrations to the cities. This was viewed very positively because he believed that modern city life destroyed the natural biological health of the nation. It also artificially uprooted people from the existential realities of nature and made them dependent upon the political chaos of profit and labor created by the capitalists and the socialists. Ludovici believed that urbanization, industrialism, religion, and the anti-existential emphasis of Western philosophy since Socrates (469-399 B.C.) were quickly leading Europe to biological ruin because of the impact of the Industrial Revolution. Ludovici was thus very impressed with what the Nazis were doing."

End excerpt.

Mark is the author of Nazi Oaks, a tour de force that shows the Nazis for what they were; Green zealots dreaming of a Wagnerian utopia. As such, they were the forerunners of modern environmentalists (as well as eugenics). Mark has now made the connections (explored but very loosely by scholars) between Nietzchean existential thinking and Nazism. A must read!

The Threat of a Global Financial Collapse

By Alan Caruba

At present, the amount of the annual Gross Domestic Product, $14 trillion—the value of all the goods and services that generate income—is exceeded by the nation’s debts.

America is presently $15 trillion in debt and it grows daily.

In a November 21 Wall Street Journal interview, Erskine Bowles of the presidential advisory commission on the nation’s debt, said “If you take 100% of the revenue that came into the country last year, every single dime of it was consumed by our mandatory spending and interest on the debt.”

“Mandatory spending in English is basically the entitlement programs, Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. That means that every single dollar we spent last year on national defense, homeland security, education, infrastructure, high-value added research—every single dollar was borrowed, and half of it was borrowed from foreign country.”

“That’s a formula for failure in anybody’s book.”

In truth, we are looking at a coming global financial collapse http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/17-quotes-about-the-coming-global-financial-collapse-that-will-make-your-hair-stand-up with experts from Credit Suisse to the Deutche Bank, the CEO of General Motors to Warren Buffett, all in agreement that the question is not if, but when.

It will come at a time when there is little, if any, real leadership to be found either in the U.S. or Europe, the most spendthrift of nations facing this crisis.

Thomas Jefferson, one of the most brilliant of our Founding Fathers, said “I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.” He also said that “It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debts as it goes.”

Another Founding Father, James Madison, warned Americans against the concentration of power saying, “I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments by those in power than by violent and sudden usurpation.”

Over the years, more and more power has been concentrated in the federal government and it requires the dismantlement and elimination of several of its components. Americans need to say no to the Departments of Education, Energy, along with the Department of Housing and Urban Development. These are all functions previously addressed by the states.

You will not find any of these activities specified in the Constitution. Consider when they came into being:

Education was established in 1953, originally as the Department of Health, Education and Welfare. In 1979, it was subdivided into Education and Health and Human Services.

The Department of Housing and Urban Affairs was created in 1965.

The Department of Energy was created in 1977.

Thus, between 1953 and 1979, a period of 26 years, the federal government took control of key factors of the nation’s affairs, most if not all are dealt with far better at the state and local level.

To these must be added Freddie Mac and Fanny Mae, two government “entities” responsible for the housing mortgage crisis and currently asking Congress for billions more to cover their losses.

The Tenth Amendment of the Constitution specifically says that “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it by the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.”

Congress is filled with men and women for whom their position has become a sinecure as they are elected and reelected, some for decades But Congress has proved itself unwilling to govern the financial affairs of the nation. A recent vote in the House rejecting a proposed balanced budget amendment reflects this.

In 2012, the voters will have the opportunity to reverse this failure, electing men and women who will vote for term limits, a balanced budget amendment, and other necessary changes.

We have witnessed what happens when Americans lose sight of the vision of our Founding Fathers and the Constitution they bequeathed to posterity.

We are that posterity.

The present generations of Americans are obligated to save the nation or see it fail.

© Alan Caruba, 2011

http://factsnotfantasy.blogspot.com/2011/11/threaty-of-global-financial-collapse.html

Leftists prefer borders closed to Pilgrims in 1620

Jack Kemp

It is interesting that, in the case of the Pilgrims, the left wants to refer to them as illegal immigrants. A 1621 peace treaty belies this. Also, the Indians suffered from a lack of written laws and "No Trespassing" signs on the beach.
There is no word on whether the Tulane professor making this claim will be giving up her home to some local Native American tribe...

I recall Hillary Clinton in her 2008 campaign talking to a Hispanic woman who confessed to being an "illegal." To this, Hillary replied, "No woman is illegal."

As the article at Newsbusters states, this is what your children will be exposed to in college. And the piece also discusses Rush Limbaugh's annual reading of "The Truth About Thanksgiving." Here's an excerpt:

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/jack-coleman/2011/11/26/melissa-harris-perry-pilgrims-were-illegal-immigrants-indians-99-perce#ixzz1eq9kBNwu

Melissa Harris-Perry: Pilgrims Were Illegal Immigrants, Indians 99 Percenters

By Jack Coleman | November 26, 2011 | 08:34

Did you know the Pilgrims were not only illegal immigrants, but part of that reviled economic elite known today
as the one percent? At least according to Tulane professor and MSNBC contributor Melissa Harris-Perry

Here's Harris-Perry on Al Sharpton's radio show earlier this week reaching for new heights in revisionism (audio)

SHARPTON: Give me your idea of the kinds of things people ought to deal with this Thursday when their families and friends get together.

HARRIS-PERRY: You know, it's an interesting question. I've been thinking a lot about Thanksgiving and the moment that we're in because, you know, our economic crisis right now is highly tied to the European economic crisis and so I was thinking about kind of what is that first Thanksgiving when these illegal immigrants from Europe come over and are fed by the people of the actual Americas, the Native and indigenous people, you know, here on this land, that they are trying to escape religious prosecution and persecution in Europe and then you have the Europeans basically calling them dirty, no good, worthless, basically 99 percenters, right? And all of that is now playing out in a different way as we see the 99 percent pushing back against this idea that the elites are the only one that deserve to have a Thanksgiving dinner. All of that.

Once again, that was Tulane University, for you parents of soon-to-be college age children. Consider yourself warned.

Harris-Perry is not alone in her take on the Pilgrims as illegals scurrying surrepitiously into America. That's also how they were depicted on the cover of this week's New Yorker.

But such a premise begs the question -- were the Pilgrims actually here illegally?

Apparently not to those who would have had a basis for making this claim -- the Native Americans who lived in southeastern Massachusetts. In fact, their leader, Wampanoag sachem Massasoit, agreed to a treaty with the Pilgrims in March 1621, just three months after the English colonists landed at an abandoned Indian village whose inhabitants had been decimated by smallpox.

Peace between Pilgrims and Wampanoag would endure for more than a half-century, until King Phillip's War in 1675, when their grown children could not resolve the differences between them.

157 Air Force Majors terminated without retirement benefits

Jack Kemp

More on Obama's war on American values and the Military. From American Thinker.

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2011/11/157_air_force_majors_terminated_without_retirement_benefits.html#ixzz1epGmFaSG

November 26, 2011

Thomas Lifson


One of the best ways to destroy American military capabilities would be to convince career military personnel -- both officers and enlisted -- that their commitment to service will not be rewarded with the retirement benefits they have earned by their faithful obedience to orders, no matter the personal cost or risks they endure. The Obama administration seems to be ready to destroy the belief that service will be rewarded as faithfully as duty was performed, one step at a time.

The latest step in that direction is the announcement that 157 Air Force majors will be terminated prior to retirement, without the opportunity to complete the 20 full years of service necessary to qualify for retirement pay. Caroline May of the Daily Caller writes:

The Chapman University of Military Law and its associated AMVETS Legal Clinic are blowing the whistle on what they say is an injustice set to be perpetrated on 157 Air Force majors on the last day of November.
"The Obama administration has ordered massive reductions in forces, resulting in many officers who are near　retirement　being involuntarily separated without retirement or medical benefits," explained institute director Maj. Kyndra Rotunda.

The Department of Defense specifies that service members within six years of retirement normally would be retained and allowed to retire on time with benefits,　unless extenuating circumstances exist such as disciplinary issues.

According to lawyers at Chapman and the AMVETS Legal Clinic, the Air Force has deviated from the six-year protection "without any legal authority."

The bond of trust between service members and the nation they serve, once broken, is difficult to rebuild. A nation unable to convince its young men and women to devote their careers to military service is left vulnerable to foreign military threat. Is that what we really want for America?
Hat tip: Bryan Demko

The Enemy Within

Timothy Birdnow

American intelligence has been compromised by Hezbollah - and an act of war has been perpetrated against us.

http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=47759

The ABC's of Amnesty

Timothy Birdnow

John Hayward has a great piece at Human Events that puts the illegal immigration issue into proper perspective.
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=47743

From the article:

"We were told the last amnesty deal would solve the problem. Now there are twice as many illegals, and we’re told we have no choice but to cook up another amnesty deal. What are you going to do, round up 12 million people and shovel them across the border? Yesterday’s government failure becomes tomorrow’s inescapable destiny. We hear this argument in many areas beyond illegal immigration.

One of the ways our immigration debate is distorted is through the expectation of instantaneous success… or, more to the point, the assessment of instantaneous failure. Our choices are either immediate deportation of 12 million souls, or blanket amnesty for immigration scofflaws, with a stopwatch used to measure the progress of either approach.

Why don’t we try the kind of common-sense enforcement proposals that prompt Eric Holder to sue the daylights out of any state that passes them, and see where that gets us? Maybe the remainder of the illegal population will be easier to deal with, from the standpoints of both fairness and humanity, once there aren’t 12 million of them anymore. Can we at least try cleaning out the drunk-driving tax-evading document forgers before we declare the problem insoluble?

The imperative to write off border security and immigration enforcement as impossible, after the kind of half-hearted attempts we’ve witnessed from the federal government, raises the hackles of law-abiding citizens who are being micro-regulated within an inch of their lives. Will the illegal aliens who get busted for failing to comply with ObamaCare be deported? Somehow our compassionate mega-State seems comfortable with monitoring, controlling, and punishing far larger populations than those 12 million illegals… when it really wants to.

Law-abiding citizens are also subjected to many lectures about the need to “pay their fair share” and provide benefits for the common good. Supposedly everyone is contributing to provide the collective benefits of government – at various finely-tuned “progressive” levels, of course. Why should they be sanguine about the prospect of a large group barging into the system, ignoring laws it doesn’t like, and digging into the government benefit buffet? When do they “pay their fair share?”'

Green Jobs Bust, Energy Jobs Boom

This courtesy of CCNET:

The Wall Street Journal, 26 November 2011
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204190704577024510087261078.html

So President Obama was right all along. Domestic energy production really is a path to prosperity and new job creation. His mistake was predicting that those new jobs would be "green," when the real employment boom is taking place in oil and gas.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported recently that the U.S. jobless rate remains a dreadful 9%. But look more closely at the data and you can see which industries are bucking the jobless trend. One is oil and gas production, which now employs some 440,000 workers, an 80% increase, or 200,000 more jobs, since 2003. Oil and gas jobs account for more than one in five of all net new private jobs in that period.

The ironies here are richer than the shale deposits in North Dakota's Bakken formation. While Washington has tried to force-feed renewable energy with tens of billions in special subsidies, oil and gas production has boomed thanks to private investment. And while renewable technology breakthroughs never seem to arrive, horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing have revolutionized oil and gas extraction—with no Energy Department loan guarantees needed.

The oil and gas rush has led to a jobs boom. North Dakota has the nation's lowest jobless rate, at 3.5%, and the state now has some 200 rigs pumping 440,000 barrels of oil a day, four times the amount in 2006. The state reports more than 16,000 current job openings, and places like Williston have become meccas for workers seeking jobs that often pay more than $100,000 a year.

Or take production in Pennsylvania's Marcellus shale formation, which the state Department of Labor and Industry says created 18,000 new jobs in the first half of 2011. Some 214,000 jobs are now tied to a natural gas industry that barely existed in the Keystone State a decade ago. Energy firms are also rushing to develop the Utica shale in eastern Ohio, and they are expanding operations in Texas, Louisiana and Oklahoma, among other places.

Good news? You'd think so, but liberals can't seem to handle this truth so they are now trying to discredit the jobs that accompany it. The American Petroleum Institute recently commissioned a study by the Wood Mackenzie consulting firm, which estimated that better federal energy policy would create an additional 1.4 million jobs by 2030.

This has caused a fury on the political left, which complains that the study included estimates of direct and indirect jobs (such as equipment suppliers) but also "induced" jobs, or jobs created when oil workers spend their salaries at, say, hotels, restaurants or bowling alleys. It seems these claims rely on—drum roll, please—"multipliers" to produce estimates of knock-on jobs.

Liberals know all about multipliers, which are the central operating conceit of modern Keynesian economics. The entire public justification for the $820 billion Obama stimulus was the claim that every $1 of spending would have a multiplier effect of 1.5 or more and thus create millions of new jobs.

That looks like a joke now. But Democrats and liberals continue to cite the black-box multiplier claims of Moody's Mark Zandi, who says the latest Obama jobs bill will create 1.9 million jobs. Some 750,000 of those jobs are supposed to appear merely from extending the payroll tax holiday for workers, giving them more money to spend on, say, hotels or restaurants or bowling alleys. All such multipliers are suspect, but the liberals can't have it both ways and invoke them to justify government spending but then repudiate them for private business.

In any case the beauty of the oil and gas boom is that multipliers aren't needed to predict job growth. It's happening right before our eyes. And it stands to reason that if the Obama Administration dropped its hostility to oil and gas energy, even more jobs would be created as the industry invested to exploit other areas with new technology and production methods.

Yet earlier this month the Interior Department released a new five-year plan that puts most of the Outer Continental Shelf off-limits for oil drilling. And the Administration has delayed for at least another year the Keystone XL pipeline that is shovel-ready to create 20,000 new direct, pipeline-related jobs.

The Office of Natural Resources Revenue recently noted that federal revenue from offshore bonus bids (from lease sales) in fiscal 2011 was merely $36 million—down from $9.5 billion in fiscal 2008. The Obama Administration has managed the nearly impossible feat of turning energy policy into a money loser, pouring taxpayer dollars into green-energy busts like Solyndra. The Washington Post reported in September that Mr. Obama's $38.6 billion green loan program had created a mere 3,500 jobs over two years. He had predicted it would "save or create" 65,000.

Mr. Obama nonetheless keeps talking about "green jobs" as if repetition will conjure them. He'd do more for the economy if he dropped the ideological illusions and embraced the job-creating, wealth-producing reality of domestic fossil fuels.

More about the Russian newsreader

Dana Mathewson

Wherein you will learn, among other things, that I was right -- she is getting marriage proposals, as well as offers to get her onto Fox News. We also learn that Russians typically do not differentiate between foreign countries' heads of state and the countries themselves, so if the lady had been flipping the bird as we thought, it would have been to the entire U.S., not to Obama. http://pjmedia.com/blog/russia%e2%80%99s-middle-finger-for-hillary%e2%80%99s-reset-button/

However, it really seems as if she was gesturing to her camera crew, who were apparently giving her a hard time, and she really thought the camera was off. Too bad. She eventually was fired for the prank. I would really like to see an offer from Fox News -- wonder if she has the language skills for it? You ask me, she's better-looking than Greta!

Give Thanks to the Alternative for He is Good; Obama Disses the Lord in Thanksgiving Radio Address

Timothy Birdnow

According to the Huffington Post, President Obama failed to mention God in his Thanksgiving address.
http://www.aol.com/2011/11/25/obama-thanksgiving-speech-god_n_1113106.html?1322241721&icid=maing-grid10%7Chtmlws-main-nb%7Cdl1%7Csec1_lnk3%7C11561

The official White House transcript verifies that, yes, the President failed to once mention the Almighty in his Thanksgiving radio address.
http://radio.foxnews.com/toddstarnes/top-stories/obama-leaves-god-out-of-thanksgiving-address.html

What he DID say was just wierd; he calls the first Thanksgiving a "celebration of community" for instance. Huh? Gee, I was under the impression it was a celebration of all the food they were able to harvest, and it was a feast to honor and thank The Lord for his beneficience.

And here's one of his more mercurial moments;

"With all the partisanship and gridlock here in Washington, it’s easy to wonder if such unity is really possible. But think about what’s happening at this very moment: Americans from all walks of life are coming together as one people, grateful for the blessings of family, community, and country.

If we keep that spirit alive, if we support each other, and look out for each other, and remember that we’re all in this together, then I know that we too will overcome the challenges of our time."

End excerpt.

This man is astonishingly ignorant. The Pilgrims were starving because they had instituted an economic system where they shared everything. It was not a matter of "everyone coming together" that solved their problems - quite the opposite. The Pilgrim colony was failing because of the communal nature of the settlement. It only flourished after a much more rigid system of capitalism was imposed. At first, the Pilgrims system banned the private ownership of land, and had no real division of labor. This worked about as well then as it does now - it failed.

According to Frank Miniter at National Review.
http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/253863/first-thanksgiving-frank-miniter

"But what is often left out of the popular account is that one reason the Pilgrims were in such peril during these first few seasons was that they were trying communal farming: During the first two and a half years, there was neither private property nor division of labor at the Plymouth Colony. No one was permitted to own any particular plot of land. Food was grown collectively and distributed equally.

Naturally, some residents began sleeping in. Everyone began pointing fingers. So Bradford concluded, “This community (so far as it was) was found to breed much confusion and discontent and retard much employment that would have been to their benefit and comfort.”

But in 1623, Plymouth Plantation’s leaders allotted private land plots and declared that if residents didn’t work, they wouldn’t eat. Productivity immediately increased."
end excerpt.

So "we're all in this together" was actually the source of starvation for the Pilgrims. It was only the institution of a competitive system that saved them.

That, of course, comes directly from the Bible, I might add, a document with which the Pilgrims were quite familiar. In 2 Thessalonians 3:10 it clearly states:

"For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: "If a man will not work, he shall not eat."

And there is no way to enforce work without providing a man his own share. Man is not a communal creature, and work in common is almost always fruitless, because there is no incentive.

Of course, Obama is monumentally ignorant (willfully, I would argue) of history. In his Thanksgiving Proclamation this year he said;

http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/11/16/presidential-proclamation-thanksgiving-day-2011

"The observance recalls the celebration of an autumn harvest centuries ago, when the Wampanoag tribe joined the Pilgrims at Plymouth Colony to share in the fruits of a bountiful season. The feast honored the Wampanoag for generously extending their knowledge of local game and agriculture to the Pilgrims, and today we renew our gratitude to all American Indians and Alaska Natives. We take this time to remember the ways that the First Americans have enriched our Nation's heritage, from their generosity centuries ago to the everyday contributions they make to all facets of American life"

End excerpt.

The Feast was in no way intended to honor the Wampanoag, although there certainly was gratitude to their assistance. The Feast honored God. It was a THANKSGIVING, a thanks to God for a decent harvest. It was, in the view of so pius a people as the Pilgrims, God who saved them. Yet Obama makes this assinine assertion.

That is because there has been a subtle shift in teaching of the story. Liberal educators have craftily claimed that the first Thanksgiving was a thanks given to the Indians by a communal people. It is one of the many subtle revisions leftists have made to American history, and many people today believe it. But it is false. This is but one of many tricks used to make the "old dead white guys" into boobs and exploiters. Forgotten in modern revisionist history is the fate of the first English colony at Roanoke http://www.learnnc.org/lp/pages/1647; every single colonist was massacred by the natives, who had become quite friendly with them. Forgotten are the kidnappings, the rapes, the massacres of white colonists. Now, I am hardly saying that all native peoples were savages, or that the English were lilly white, but that the narrative of the "noble savage" which so enthralls liberals (doubtlessly like Obama), the notion that all evil came from Europe, is a monumental lie. Yet it is part of the narrative, and Obama's comments fit right in.

Granted, Obama mentions God much more in his Proclamation than in his radio address. But, of course, Obama often refers to himself when speaking of God. His "if you love me pass this jobs bill" echoes the words of Jesus "Simon son of John, do you love me? Feed my sheep." for instance, so one wonders if he isn't venerating himself. Still, his failure to mention God in his radio address dovetails with his refusal to put "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance. One suspects that Obama magnifies himself a bit more than the Alpha and the Omega.

Oh, wait; he specifically asked us to avoid that!
http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2011/09/obama-dont-compare-me-to-the-almighty-compare-me-to-the-alternative/

“Don’t call me the Almighty, call me the alternative.”

Indeed!


http://sites.google.com/site/barackobamajokes/obamamessiahjokes

Proof that Barack is the Obamessiah

Obama preached to the multitude by the side of the lake.

Obama created new states from out of the void.

Obama turned whine into Kool-Aid® for his followers.

Obama came to us carried upon a donkey.

Obama triumphed over the beast, the enemy of all men.

Obama was stoned and yet he has risen.

Obama's flock has millions of sheep.

Obama will reign over us from a house with many rooms.

You must have no other candidates before Obama.

Obama will raise voters from the dead. Count on it.

Dumb and Dumber Climate Alarmists

Contributor Alan Caruba has an outstanding piece at Icecap:

http://icecap.us/index.php/go/political-climate

Climategate, Part Duh!

By Alan Caruba

At what point will it finally occur to the pea-brained legion of journalists, academics, alleged scientists, United Nations propagandists, and others still blathering about “global warming” and “climate
change” that there is no global warming and that the climate has been changing for the past 4.5 billion years on planet Earth?



It would appear that no amount of the evidence of fraud is sufficient to convince them they have either participated or been taken in by the greatest hoax of the modern era.

Perhaps, though, the latest release of thousands of emails between the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change perpetrators may push them toward a rational conclusion and release the rest of humanity from the penalties and costs imposed by the global warming hoax.

It’s not that the IPCC is not relentless in this ugly business. A report released on November 18 by these reprehensible liars predicted “more extreme weather events.”

Well, duh! There isn’t a day that goes by without an extreme weather event occurring somewhere on the Earth. One might consider the weather at the northern and southern poles extreme. Or the heat of the Earth’s deserts? Then throw in the usual blizzards, floods, and droughts - and you have a non-stop variety of “extreme weather events” to which to point.

To put it another way, the whole hoax was working just fine until the Earth began to cool around 1998. So naturally the IPCC had to (1) change the terminology from global warming to climate change, (2) deny that its “scientists” were lying, and (3) continue the pathetic prediction scheme by pointing to “weather events.”

As reported in The Wall Street Journal, “The scientific link between climate change and extreme weather, however, isn’t uniformly clear, according to the report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, established in 1988 to assist policy makers with climate change.”

That’s right, this whole farce has been going on since 1988. At what point will the “enablers” of global warming accept defeat? Not soon if one considers that the IPCC is laying on another climate conference to be held in Durban, South Africa from November 28 to December 9. It will be the 17th opportunity for these deceivers to gather to wine and dine while taxpayers from the many nations they represent pick up the tab.

Here’s the kicker. “Christina Figueres, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, said “the report also underscored the need for governments to take action to reduce emissions.”

What emissions? Carbon dioxide? A trace gas in the atmosphere (0.038%) that has no effect whatever on climate or weather?

Does anyone grasp how costly all the lies about “emissions” have been and continue to be? The Christmas tree to be erected at the Capitol in Washington, D.C. comes complete with the purchase of so-called “carbon offsets” to pay for its transport 4,200 miles across the country from California. Eighty million tons of “carbon credits” were purchased.

Bear in mind, that tree and all others depend on carbon dioxide in the same way humans and other creatures depend on oxygen! CO2 is vital to the growth of all vegetation on Earth. Without it, we all die.

But what is one Christmas tree compared to an entire nation, Australia, whose government just imposed a carbon-emissions tax on everything? The tax will drive existing heavy industry and other generators of CO2 from the nation that can afford to leave and make those who cannot less competitive with global manufacturers and other businesses. Some business will just shut their doors.

This kind of deception is global. The International Energy Agency announced in early November that “dangerous climate change will be essentially irreversible within little over five years.” The news report concluded saying “The IEA uses conclusions from research collated by the United Nations. Most climate scientists agree with the U.N. conclusions, although recent polls show a growing proportion of the public in many countries is skeptical of climate change.”

No, most climate scientists do not agree with the U.N. data because they know how flawed and frequently fraudulent it is. This kind of casual journalistic reference is a lie, along with all the rest of the global warming and/or climate change data from “official” sources like the IPCC and IEA, et al.

In early November the U.S. Department of Energy published “estimates” of global carbon dioxide emissions for the year 2010. Writing in Forbes, James Taylor of The Heartland Institute, took note that the Department concluded that “emissions rose by 6% from 2009 to 2010. This constitutes the largest rise yet recorded.” And then he added that “global temperatures have not risen during the past decade.’

There is no correlation. Never was.

Whether it is the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the International Energy Agency, the U.S. Departments of Energy, Interior, and the Environmental Protection Agency, all depend on people being too ignorant or indifferent to grasp the truth that everything done in the name of global warming, climate change, or carbon dioxide emissions is a costly, evil deception.

Michael Mann Receives Award

Timothy Birdnow

Utterly astonishing!

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-11/ps-mtr111611.php

From the press release:

"Michael Mann, professor of meteorology and geosciences and director, Earth System Science Center, Penn State, was awarded the Hans Oeschger Medal of the European Geosciences Union.

The medal was established in 2001 in recognition of the scientific achievements of Hans Oeschger to honor outstanding scientists whose work is related to climate: past, present and future.

Mann's research involves the use of theoretical models and observational data to better understand Earth's climate system. He is best known for the "hockey stick," a chart he and his co-authors published in 1999 using proxy climate data such as tree-rings and ice cores to estimate temperatures over the past thousand years. The hockey stick demonstrated that temperatures had risen with the increase in industrialization and use of fossil fuels and is the subject of Mann's new book, "The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars," due out in early 2012."

Obama's Tin Ear to Christmas in New York

Jack E. Kemp

Obama will be going to a gay rights fundraiser at the NY Sheraton (7th Ave. & 53rd Street) http://www.starwoodhotels.com/sheraton/property/overview/index.html?propertyID=421 on the same night as the Rockefeller Center tree lighting at 50th Street between Fifth and Sixth (officially called "Avenue of the Americas) Avenues. This will cause a gridlock nightmare in midtown Manhattan next Wednesday. If that weren't enough, teen hearthrob Justin Bieber will be performing there.

Typically, Christians come from all around New York City to see the tree lighting which is carried nationally on NBC television, the resident of the GE Building (30 Rockefeller Center - or 30 Rock, for short) directly behind/west of the Christmas tree. This will inconvenience the Christmas (not merely "winter") holiday crowds and punish them, de facto, for wanting to share in the Joy of their holiday season in a busy New York City.

As the New York Post states it,
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/manhattan/cash_chaos_on_yule_tree_day_HixCW5a2UlmlSgeJ35498L#ixzz1efifNk2S

"President Obama has an unwelcome holiday gift for New Yorkers — he’ll be coming to Midtown the same day the streets will be impossibly clogged by the Rockefeller Plaza tree-lighting ceremony. He has picked Wednesday, one of the busiest gridlock-alert days of the year, to descend on the area with his motorcade for a fund-raiser and party."
END

On December 6th, 2006, the Federal government raided Swift meat packing plants around the US to remove a number of illegal alien workers, many from Mexico. http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2006/12/liberals_sudden_new_respect_fo.html
Since this day was The Virgin of Guadalupe Day and Hispanics are a group that Democrats want to impress "how much they care," the Dems became very "outraged" about hurting the feelings of these worshipers of Christ. However this December in New York, Christians of all ethnic nationalities (and there are many New Yorkers of Puerto Rican and Dominican origin) are okay to inconvenience. Granted, this isn't a religious holiday, but it is part of the Christmas season celebrations.

In 1998, some Democrat Jews in Congress and their liberal Jewish supporters were making a big stink about The House Judiciary Committee releasing a video of President Clinton's testimony concerning his relationship with Monica Lewinsky. The tape was released on Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. They claimed it hurt their religious sensibilities. As if they couldn't read the papers a day later. These are the same Democrats who now say nothing when Obama calls for a return to Israel's 1967 (really 1949 Armistice) indefensible borders. If you want to split hairs as to whether these are two equivalents situations, look up "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem" in a Bible and get back to me.

So how come Democrats aren't protesting Barack Obama's clogging the streets in mid December in New York as being insensitive to Christians? Perhaps they believe that since Obama is the REAL Messiah, any public celebrations related to Jesus are merely those of a secondary prophet. You may laugh at my sarcasm, but there's more truth to my previous sentence than meets the eye. Would Obama clog the streets with a motorcade near the Islamic Center of Washington, DC, during a major Muslim holiday celebration?

Stolen Valor, an introduction

Jack E. Kemp

I've been reading a lot of things lately, including some books on psychology which lead me to some on the psychology of war and fighting, written by actual veteran authors. Recently I got in the mail a copy of "Stolen Valor" by B.G. Burkett and Glenna Whitley, about how Vietnam vets were badly treated and their complex tales. I just skimmed it for now.I rushed to see the chapter on Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and found its beginning had a very pragmatic angle.

The first stories are about fake combat vets who claim to have PTSD so they get higher VA benefits, and how easy it is to fool a civilian doctor. A VA counselor, a former Special Forces vet from Vietnam who later studied psychology, became a de facto detective. One time he was invited to talk to a group of 8 vets who claimed to be

Special Forces with combat related issues in a VA hospital counseling session. He brought documentation of his Silver Star, his Purple Heart, his jump wings, Special Warfare School certificate, etc. and started asking them questions. They got defensive (like some phony 9/11 vets) and told him, "Man, you don't know what you're talking about!" Many of them claimed they had gone on secret missions in Cambodia that were not on their military records. After the counselor heard them mispronounce some military slang, hearing them say they arrived in Vietnam in a certain unit in some year that the counselor personally knew unit didn't arrive until a year later, etc., the counselor came to the conclusion they were all faking it. Some of these characters were actual veterans but did not serve in combat - the others may not have been veterans at all. The counselor also kept a written govt. list of when all units arrived in Vietnam to double check.

Both this combat vet counselor and the doctors are all but unwilling to file papers to throw phonies out of the VA hospital because the paperwork involved is long and complicated and involves hard legal fights. The counselor wouldn't even openly tell them they were phonies when he met them with their families. Being a combat vet was their identity, part of their life - even when it wasn't true.

Skipping around the book, I see that a few phonies actually got to themselves elected President or Vice President of a local VFW or similar vets' organization on the outside. These guys were outgoing and well liked - and even in one case where a phony was prosecuted by the government and found guilty, their buddies in the VFW still stood up for them, not believing a court proven conviction. That happened, in my opinion, because these charismatic guys offered their buddies a level of companionship, acceptance, and friendship that no civilian - shrink or regular citizen - could or did offer them.

The Special Forces vet/counselor once significantly helped a veteran who felt guilty about sending eight troops under his command forward too fast (they were killed by US artillery). This happened when the counselor being the first person to tell this officer, "Yeah, you f***ed up." The civilian doctors wouldn't say that, gave the officer pills, resulting in his never having to face the guilt that was eating him until he met this veteran/counselor.

Yes, real life is complex. And I didn't know you could find this kind of realism admitted to in a book.

Comment by Lawrence Morris 25 minutes ago

If anyone knows a Veteran having PTSD issues (they use to call it "shell shock" in the old days) i.e. anger, isolationism, marital problems or any type of anti-social tendencies please encourage that person to seek out help from the closest Vet Center. Go to (www.vetcenter.va.gov) for more information. I should point out I am a Vietnam

Vet and have greatly benefited from their program. The vast majority of Therapist working at the Vet Centers are Veterans, like myself, which explains why the program has been so successful for me and for so many others like me.

I became so impressed and active with the Vet Center program and have devoted so much time helping other Vets, the County Board of Supervisor for my District appointed me to the County Veterans Advisory Committee.

This is why I encourage anyone and everyone to step up and spread the word to other Vets in need. Most Vets with PTSD symptoms have no idea this program is available for them. There is no financial obligation (except for maybe gas money getting to the Center).

One other thing, Vets that technically didn't have 'boots on the ground' in a combat zone may still be eligible if they experienced stress collateral damage outside of a Combat Zone. I'm especially talking about support service Veterans near the Zone which experienced casualties of war that are to graphic to go into detail.



Larry Morris

Jackie Cooper, USN - R.I.P. (z''l)

Jack Kemp

A link and an excerpt:

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/jackie-cooper-usn_610036.html

Jackie Cooper, USN
Vitorino Matus
Nov. 22, 2011

I’d never gone to a memorial service at Arlington National Cemetery until this morning. But through a friend I was invited to attend the interment of retired Captain John Cooper Jr. who served in the United States Navy during World War II and remained active in the reserves for the next several decades. During the service, the rabbi spoke of Cooper’s time in the Pacific and his dedication to the Navy over the years but left out (perhaps intentionally) what Cooper is most remembered for—his life in Hollywood as Jackie Cooper.
Jackie Cooper, USN

Cooper had resigned himself to being called Jackie even in old age. (“Jackie Cooper dies at 88,” ran Variety’s headline last May. ) After all, he was one of Hollywood’s first child actors. Cooper was one of the original “Little Rascals” in the Our Gang series (he had the crush on Miss Crabtree). And in 1931, he became the youngest actor nominated for an Academy Award for a leading role, a record held until 2004 (there have been younger actors who have been nominated for Oscars in supporting roles).

More on Climategate 2.0

Timothy Birdnow

Our friend Pete Ridley directs our attention to Junk Science, where the inimitable Steven Milloy has a bushel full of new Climategate 2.0 e-mails.

http://junkscience.com/2011/11/22/climategate-2-0-is-here/

Among the choice reading:

* Jones says media, especially BBC, has alarmist bias
* Wigley knows why paleo-reconstructions are junk science
* Jones says 2-degree C limit ‘plucked out of thin air’
* Alarmists looked to ally with Goldman Sachs
* Climategate 2.0: Phil Jones complains about omnipresent deniers
* Ducking confrontation on ‘Great Global Warming Swindle’
* Alarmist introspection admits dishonesty on hockey stick
* Jones laments blogsites as allowing deniers to find one another/a>
* Systematic deletion of e-mails
* How Phil Jones misleads journalists
* Santer angry over not being able to silence skeptics
* Mann says true temp anomaly not known well
* Silence of the alarmists
* Wigley accuses ‘Mike’, other IPCC-ers of deception, dishonesty
* Spun science isn’t going to end well
* Department of Energy involved in hiding temperature data?
* Jones advises e-mail deletion to avoid FOIA
* Mann says Curry not helping ‘the cause’
* ‘All models wrong’
* IPCC models not worth a darn
* Hulme hired to be the hand of God
* Praying for the ‘Day After Tomorrow’ to work
* Catholicism an ‘extreme’ religion?
* Mann a dead-ender
* Mann paper slammed by colleague as ‘pathetic’
* ‘Hockey stick’ debunking confirmed
* Hide the dissent
* Feelings more important than truth
* Kjellén has a better name for global warming
* Jones bans dissent on extreme weather
* Medieval Warm Period tough to erase
* Mann said skeptics ‘losing’
* Climategate 2.0?

This is a must-read!

I wonder; will this finally get someone at least fired? Frankly, this is grounds for indictment for fraud and racketeering.

Don't hold your breath though, folks!

Christian Refugees at back of the bus - or under it - in U.S. policy

Jack Kemp


The following is a longish excerpt from Pamela Geller's Atlas Shrugs website. I suggest you read this first, then the entire article at the internet link:

http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2011/11/-afghan-christians-in-danger-at-home-and-abroad-are-refused-refugee-status-while-muslim-refugee-emig.html

Christians in Imminent Danger Across the World Are Refused Refugee Status While Muslim Refugee Immigration Goes Unimpeded
US policy regarding the refugee resettlement program would shock most Americans if they only knew. The UN picks who becomes US refugees. Christians are being refused refugee status and face persecution and many times certain death for their religious beliefs under the sharia, while whole Muslim communities are entering the US by the tens of thousnds per month despite the fact that they face no religious persecution.



It is horrifiying that Afghan Christians are being refused refugee status by the UN and many Western nations, including Britain. The UN claims that Afghan Christians do not meet the criteria for refugees under Statute 6B of the UN High Commission of Refugees (UNHCR), which requires refugees to have "a well founded fear of persecution by reason of his race, religion, nationality or political opinion."
Since 1976, millions of new citizens have entered America as legal humanitarian refugees, according to reports of the US State Department. The Somalis are certified as "humanitarian refugees" under our State Department rules. Whole Muslim communities are imported into the United States, and they are supported by social services provided by the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The cities who receive these huge numbers are determined by Refugee Councils. And yet back in October 2008, Muslim UN employees were "discouraging" applications for resettlement from the desperate Christian Iraqis.



The Christian Iraqi population has since been decimated. By buying into the argument that Islam is a religion of peace and ignoring the penalties for apostasy, we are sentencing thousands of Christians to martyrdom and forcing others to live in the shadows in dire poverty. We need to demand that our government provide protection and asylum for Christian apostates.
Humanitarian refugees have literally won the proverbial lottery. Typically, they receive green cards as resident aliens within a year of arrival and are eligible to become full US citizens within five years, unless they violate our immigration laws, commit a felony or are deported. In the process they are provided with cash stipend and social services assistance from federal, state, NGO’s and voluntary agency contractors.


The irony is the mandate of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) determines which of the world’s huddled masses comes to the US as humanitarian refugees. UNHCR trends for 2006 indicate that worldwide there were more than 32.9 million ‘persons of concern’ with approximately one third defined as ‘refugees’. Major refugee ‘hot spots’ include the Horn of Africa with Somalia, Darfur in the Sudan and Ethiopia, Iraq, Pakistan and Myanmar. The US is the third highest ranked country in terms of hosting refugees. The annual budget for the UNHCR is over $1.7 billion derived from government contributions, foundation grants and donations. A veritable cottage industry of federal and state alphabet soup agencies, NGO’s and voluntary agencies or VOLAG contractors has sprung up to facilitate absorption of humanitarian refugees. (more here)
This is no accident. We know that the UN is driven largely by the largest bloc of countries, the OIC (Organization of Islamic Cooperation). The OIC is one of the largest intergovernmental organizations in the world.
The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) is a religious and political organization. Close to the Muslim World League of the Muslim Brotherhood, it shares the Brotherhood's strategic and cultural vision: that of a universal religious community, the Ummah, based upon the Koran, the Sunna, and the canonical orthodoxy of shari'a. The OIC represents 56 countries and the Palestinian Authority (considered a state), the whole constituting the universal Ummah with a community of more than one billion three to six hundred million Muslims.



The OIC has a unique structure among nations and human societies. The Vatican and the various churches are de facto devoid of political power, even if they take part in politics, because in Christianity, as in Judaism, the religious and political functions have to be separated. Asian religions, too, do not represent systems that bring together religion, strategy, politics, and law within a single organizational structure. (More from Bat Yeor)
SECTION OMITTED

Is this why we expended incalcuable blood and treasure in Afghanistan? So that Christians would face persecution and slaughter? What was the objective? Sharia?
Afghan Christians in Danger at Home and Abroad
By Aidan Clay (hat tip Diane)

November 16 (ICC) – The following urgent message from Obaid S. Christ, an Afghan Christian living in New Delhi, arrived in my inbox two weeks ago:

“I just received a warning call from a person who introduced himself as an [official at the Afghan embassy]… If I don't go to the embassy in two hours to meet him, he will arrest [me] and present me to the embassy through the Indian police… Please pray and be in contact, and if in case something happens, my wife will contact you. He was claiming that I convert people from Islam to Christianity.”

SECTION OMITTED

Threats against Afghan converts to Christianity should not be taken lightly. Conversion is viewed as a serious crime in Afghanistan and Christians are frequently targeted by both the government and extremists. Earlier this year, a video was released of the beheading of an Afghan man, Abdul Latif, by four Islamist militants near Herat. The militants, who claim to be the Taliban, read a passage from the Hadiths before executing the victim: “Mohammad (peace be upon him) says, ‘Whoever changes his religion should be executed.’”

End

A NOTE FROM DANA MATHEWSON:

Damn! What makes this even worse is the fact (which I got from Joel C. Rosenberg) that X-million (can't remember the number at the moment) Muslims are converting to Christianity every year -- the figure is from an Arab cleric. These people are certainly at terrible risk from Muslims, who aren't very warm to the idea of apostasy.

Damn the U.N., and damn our willingness to go along with them. And as far as I'm concerned, they can take every damn Somali in Minnesota, at least, and ship 'em back.

itical indicators

Dana Mathewson

One way of getting an idea of which candidates are most popular is to gauge the amount of money they raise in contributions.

But money gets spent on candidates in more than one way. Here's one that we often don't think about.

http://www.urgentagenda.com/PERMALINKS%20VI/NOVEMBER%202011/22.SALES.HTML

"This past week, anti-Obama merchandise outpaced sales of pro-Obama merchandise 79 percent to 21 percent at the online clothing store CafePress, which has been tracking sales of election-relevant items.


"CafePress, an online custom merchandise shop, launched its 2012 “Election Meter” at the beginning of November but has been tracking the trends in candidate merchandise sales since April.




"According to the clothier, the “Meter” successfully predicted President Obama’s victory in 2008. This week’s data represents a stark contrast to Obama’s sales during the 2008 election cycle."

Some Lightenment

Since I am, for all practical purposes, retired, I regard it as a public service -- nay, a duty -- to bring a bit of humor into other peoples' lives, since they don't necessarily have the time or the resources to devote to it.

With that in mind, enjoy this little tidbit that I, along with the gentlemen who host the Power Line web site, and the tireless reporters of the Washington Post, have dug up for our enlightenment:

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2011/11/occupyfail-a-profile-in-bad-choices.php

OWS needs more cowbell

Dana Mathewson

Brought to you by Minnesota Majority, no less. http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2011/11/ows-needs-more-cowbell.php

Everything old is new again. :)

Karl Marx visits Occupy Wall Street

Dana Mathewson

Barry Rubin once again proves his genius in this one:

http://yidwithlid.blogspot.com/2011/11/karl-marx-visits-occupy-wall-street.html

I won't quote any of it -- that would spoil the fun. Check it out

No, this is not from The Onion

Dana Mathewson

Longtime Chicago Democratic fundraiser Tony Rezko has been sentenced to 10 1/2 years in the poky. Oh, darn!

"Antonin “Tony” Rezko, a long-time Political fundraiser for Illinois Democrats, has been sentenced to 10 1/2 years in prison for extorting millions from companies seeking state business or hoping to have favorable regulations written for them by government. The money was sought as donations to politicians such as disgraced former Governor Rod Blagojevich — Rezko was his top fundraiser — and President Barack Obama."

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/rightwingnews/hGmL/~3/CFygPr6iCfs/

This has also been reported in the Chicago Tribune. "On a side note, John Ruberry notes that it is curious that the Chicago Tribune somehow forgot to mention that Rezko was also a fundraiser for Obama."

Oh, I'm sure it was just an editorial oversight. Newspapers have so much to report these days, you know.

--
"You never feel better than when you start feeling good after you've been feeling bad." -- William Least Heat-Moon

Tony Rezko to do hard time

Dana Mathewson

Longtime Chicago Democratic fundraiser Tony Rezko has been sentenced to 10 1/2 years in the poky. Oh, darn!

"Antonin “Tony” Rezko, a long-time Political fundraiser for Illinois Democrats, has been sentenced to 10 1/2 years in prison for extorting millions from companies seeking state business or hoping to have favorable regulations written for them by government. The money was sought as donations to politicians such as disgraced former Governor Rod Blagojevich — Rezko was his top fundraiser — and President Barack Obama."

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/rightwingnews/hGmL/~3/CFygPr6iCfs/

This has also been reported in the Chicago Tribune. "On a side note, John Ruberry notes that it is curious that the Chicago Tribune somehow forgot to mention that Rezko was also a fundraiser for Obama."

Oh, I'm sure it was just an editorial oversight. Newspapers have so much to report these days, you know.

--
"You never feel better than when you start feeling good after you've been feeling bad." -- William Least Heat-Moon

Orly Taitz Challenges Disgracful New Hampshire Officials

Jack Kemp

In a 57 minute YouTube video, you can see and hear Orly Taitz ask questions of the New Hampshire Secretary of State commissioners and make accusations that not one elected federal official has had the courage to make. Then again, elected officials don't have the free time to fight in court like Mrs. Taitz.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BUcyb5pmUKI ; This video also appeared on the liberal Huffington Post, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/22/orly-taitz-obama-birth-certificate-new-hampshire_n_1108144.html?1321990201&ncid=webmail2 indicating that perhaps friends of "Hillary...or any other Democrat...for President 2012" may be very interested in greasing the skids under Mr. Obama's credibility and campaign.

Taitz pointed out several times that Obama has a Connecticut Social Security Number - and also pointing out that Obama's good friend Bill Ayers wrote in his book "Fugitive Days" that Ayers used to go to cemetaries to get birth dates of infants who died around the time Ayers was born. Up until fairly recent years, infants weren't issued

Social Security numbers at birth. This earlier practice allowed Ayers to go to the Social Security Administration and file for a SS card with a "valid" birth certificate number. Orly Taitz looked on Federal Databases and could not find a name to go with Obama's Connecticut Social Security number. And Obama supposedly got his first SS card in Hawaii at age 15 - from over six thousand miles away?

Concerning Obama's birth certificate, Taitz presented evidence of poor quality copying. She called Obama's birth certificate a low quality fraud that her three children could create, and possibly better.

Taitz openly states that if the New Hampshire Election Commission allows this fraud to go forward for a man who commands the US nuclear arsenal, the Election Commission will become party "to the most egregious election fraud ever committed against this nation and the people of this nation" and also social security fraud and "you might be complicit to treason." Wow. She said the "T-word." And I thought Ann Coulter had balls.

Taitz pointed out that in order be a high elected federal official, you don't have to go through a background check - but in order to be a janitor in the White House, you have to go through a background check. She further added that is why this Election Commission hearing is so important.

Taitz also attacked Obama's autobiographical claim of having attended Columbia University for two years by producing a record from the Student Clearing House which has him only attending Columbia for nine months.

In a pre-summation, Taitz said, "In your hands, is national security of The United States of America."

I was applauding while sitting at my computer listening to Mrs. Taitz's well documented opening legal arguments.

At 46:28 into the video, Orly Taitz, with her fairly thick Russian accent, asks the New Hampshire Assistant Secretary of State whether she (Taitz), having been born in the Soviet Union, were to bring to the Assistant Secetary a signed piece of paper saying that she was qualified to run for President and give the state official a check for $1000, would the Assistant Secretary then put Orly Taitz on the ballot (to run for President of the US).

The Assistant Secretary of State said that yes, she would do that if there were no challenges. This was, to me, a shocking statement. A woman comes to New Hampshare and sounds like Mrs. Gorbachev with more English lessons and a woman entrusted to uphold the laws of the New Hampshire and the United States Constitution openly admits they she herself would not immediately challenge Mrs. Taitz's attempt to be on the United States Presidential ballot - or at least demand more proof on the spot. The late Lawrence Welk had a German accent because he was born into a German speaking area of the US. One would hope that if Welk had applied in New Hampshire to run for President, they would want to see a birth certificate before the state went to any further bother in processing his application. And, once again, Mrs. Taitz openly admitted in her example that she was admitting up front that was born in the Soviet Union.

This whole dismal event shows exactly how hollow and unworthy these election commissioners really are. And the general demeanor of the Assistant Secretary of State is, in my opinion, tired, hollow and defeated - and matching the general demeaner of the entire committee. Please watch the video, perhaps from the 42 minute mark, to see whether you agree with my assessment.

The officials left the room and returned shortly. The Secretary of State ruled for Obama and against Orly Taitz's challenge. The committee's attorney claimed they only had juristiction on the propriety of the application form itself and they were not empowered to rule on the merits of Orly Taitz's challenge. What a whitewash - not one vote against Obama. Audience members cried out, "Shame! Traitors!"

One hopes the Secretary of State of Virginia, Utah, Alabama or some other state makes a wiser ruling to at least rule on the applicant's qualifications - and rule in Taitz's favor.

Son of Climategate

Timothy Birdnow

Ron De Haan points our attention to an Freedom of Information unveiling of many more e-mails in the ongoing saga of Climategate. They are quite shocking! I got this courtesy of Tallbloke (a site everyone should read). http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2011/11/22/breaking-news-foia-2011-has-arrived/

Be sure to visit Tallbloke's talkshop for all the comments; they are excellent!

Here is the downloadable file
http://tallbloke.files.wordpress.com/2011/11/foia2011.png

/// FOIA 2011 — Background and Context ///

“Over 2.5 billion people live on less than $2 a day.”

“Every day nearly 16.000 children die from hunger and related causes.”

“One dollar can save a life” — the opposite must also be true.

“Poverty is a death sentence.”

“Nations must invest $37 trillion in energy technologies by 2030 to stabilize
greenhouse gas emissions at sustainable levels.”

Today’s decisions should be based on all the information we can get, not on
hiding the decline.

This archive contains some 5.000 emails picked from keyword searches. A few
remarks and redactions are marked with triple brackets.

The rest, some 220.000, are encrypted for various reasons. We are not planning
to publicly release the passphrase.

We could not read every one, but tried to cover the most relevant topics such
as…

/// The IPCC Process ///

<1939> Thorne/MetO:

Observations do not show rising temperatures throughout the tropical
troposphere unless you accept one single study and approach and discount a
wealth of others. This is just downright dangerous. We need to communicate the
uncertainty and be honest. Phil, hopefully we can find time to discuss these
further if necessary [...]
<3066> Thorne:

I also think the science is being manipulated to put a political spin on it
which for all our sakes might not be too clever in the long run.
<1611> Carter:

It seems that a few people have a very strong say, and no matter how much
talking goes on beforehand, the big decisions are made at the eleventh hour by
a select core group.
<2884> Wigley:

Mike, The Figure you sent is very deceptive [...] there have been a number of
dishonest presentations of model results by individual authors and by IPCC [...]
<4755> Overpeck:

The trick may be to decide on the main message and use that to guid[e] what’s
included and what is left out.
<3456> Overpeck:

I agree w/ Susan [Solomon] that we should try to put more in the bullet about
“Subsequent evidence” [...] Need to convince readers that there really has been
an increase in knowledge – more evidence. What is it?
<1104> Wanner/NCCR:

In my [IPCC-TAR] review [...] I crit[i]cized [...] the Mann hockey[s]tick [...]
My review was classified “unsignificant” even I inquired several times. Now the
internationally well known newspaper SPIEGEL got the information about these
early statements because I expressed my opinion in several talks, mainly in
Germany, in 2002 and 2003. I just refused to give an exclusive interview to
SPIEGEL because I will not cause damage for climate science.
<0414> Coe:

Hence the AR4 Section 2.7.1.1.2 dismissal of the ACRIM composite to be
instrumental rather than solar in origin is a bit controversial. Similarly IPCC
in their discussion on solar RF since the Maunder Minimum are very dependent on
the paper by Wang et al (which I have been unable to access) in the decision to
reduce the solar RF significantly despite the many papers to the contrary in
the ISSI workshop. All this leaves the IPCC almost entirely dependent on CO2
for the explanation of current global temperatures as in Fig 2.23. since
methane CFCs and aerosols are not increasing.

<2009> Briffa:

I find myself in the strange position of being very skeptical of the quality of
all present reconstructions, yet sounding like a pro greenhouse zealot here!
<2775> Jones:

I too don’t see why the schemes should be symmetrical. The temperature ones
certainly will not as we’re choosing the periods to show warming.
<1219> Trenberth:

[...] opposing some things said by people like Chris Landsea who has said all the
stuff going on is natural variability. In addition to the 4 hurricanes hitting
Florida, there has been a record number hit Japan 10?? and I saw a report
saying Japanese scientists had linked this to global warming. [...] I am leaning
toward the idea of getting a box on changes in hurricanes, perhaps written by a
Japanese.
<0890> Jones:

We can put a note in that something will be there in the next draft, or Kevin
or I will write something – it depends on whether and what we get from Japan.
<0170> Jones:

Kevin, Seems that this potential Nature paper may be worth citing, if it does
say that GW is having an effect on TC activity.
<0714> Jones:

Getting people we know and trust [into IPCC] is vital – hence my comment about
the tornadoes group.
<3205> Jones:

Useful ones [for IPCC] might be Baldwin, Benestad (written on the solar/cloud
issue – on the right side, i.e anti-Svensmark), Bohm, Brown, Christy (will be
have to involve him ?)
<4923> Stott/MetO:

My most immediate concern is to whether to leave this statement ["probably the
warmest of the last millennium"] in or whether I should remove it in the
anticipation that by the time of the 4th Assessment Report we’ll have withdrawn
this statement – Chris Folland at least seems to think this is possible.

/// Communicating Climate Change ///

<2495> Humphrey/DEFRA:

I can’t overstate the HUGE amount of political interest in the project as a
message that the Government can give on climate change to help them tell their
story. They want the story to be a very strong one and don’t want to be made
to look foolish.
<0813> Fox/Environment Agency:

if we loose the chance to make climate change a reality to people in the
regions we will have missed a major trick in REGIS.
<4716> Adams:

Somehow we have to leave the[m] thinking OK, climate change is extremely
complicated, BUT I accept the dominant view that people are affecting it, and
that impacts produces risk that needs careful and urgent attention.
<1790> Lorenzoni:

I agree with the importance of extreme events as foci for public and
governmental opinion [...] ‘climate change’ needs to be present in people’s
daily lives. They should be reminded that it is a continuously occurring and
evolving phenomenon
<3062> Jones:

We don’t really want the bullshit and optimistic stuff that Michael has written
[...] We’ll have to cut out some of his stuff.
<1485> Mann:

the important thing is to make sure they’re loosing the PR battle. That’s what
the site [Real Climate] is about.
<2428> Ashton/co2.org:

Having established scale and urgency, the political challenge is then to turn
this from an argument about the cost of cutting emissions – bad politics – to
one about the value of a stable climate – much better politics. [...] the most
valuable thing to do is to tell the story about abrupt change as vividly as
possible
<3332> Kelly:

the current commitments, even with some strengthening, are little different
from what would have happened without a climate treaty.
[...] the way to pitch the analysis is to argue that precautionary action must be
taken now to protect reserves etc against the inevitable
<3655> Singer/WWF:

we as an NGO working on climate policy need such a document pretty soon for the
public and for informed decision makers in order to get a) a debate started and
b) in order to get into the media the context between climate
extremes/desasters/costs and finally the link between weather extremes and
energy
<0445> Torok/CSIRO:

[...] idea of looking at the implications of climate change for what he termed
“global icons” [...] One of these suggested icons was the Great Barrier Reef [...]
It also became apparent that there was always a local “reason” for the
destruction – cyclones, starfish, fertilizers [...] A perception of an
“unchanging” environment leads people to generate local explanations for coral
loss based on transient phenomena, while not acknowledging the possibility of
systematic damage from long-term climatic/environmental change [...] Such a
project could do a lot to raise awareness of threats to the reef from climate
change
<4141> Minns/Tyndall Centre:

In my experience, global warming freezing is already a bit of a public
relations problem with the media

Kjellen:

I agree with Nick that climate change might be a better labelling than global
warming

Pierrehumbert:

What kind of circulation change could lock Europe into deadly summer heat waves
like that of last summer? That’s the sort of thing we need to think about.

/// The Medieval Warm Period ///

<5111> Pollack:

But it will be very difficult to make the MWP go away in Greenland.
<5039> Rahmstorf:

You chose to depict the one based on C14 solar data, which kind of stands out
in Medieval times. It would be much nicer to show the version driven by Be10
solar forcing
<5096> Cook:

A growing body of evidence clearly shows [2008] that hydroclimatic variability
during the putative MWP (more appropriately and inclusively called the
“Medieval Climate Anomaly” or MCA period) was more regionally extreme (mainly
in terms of the frequency and duration of megadroughts) than anything we have
seen in the 20th century, except perhaps for the Sahel. So in certain ways the
MCA period may have been more climatically extreme than in modern times.

/// The Settled Science ///

<0310> Warren:

The results for 400 ppm stabilization look odd in many cases [...] As it stands
we’ll have to delete the results from the paper if it is to be published.
<1682> Wils:

[2007] What if climate change appears to be just mainly a multidecadal natural
fluctuation? They’ll kill us probably [...]
<2267> Wilson:

Although I agree that GHGs are important in the 19th/20th century (especially
since the 1970s), if the weighting of solar forcing was stronger in the models,
surely this would diminish the significance of GHGs.
[...] it seems to me that by weighting the solar irradiance more strongly in the
models, then much of the 19th to mid 20th century warming can be explained from
the sun alone.
<5289> Hoskins:

If the tropical near surface specific humidity over tropical land has not gone
up (Fig 5) presumably that could explain why the expected amplification of the
warming in the tropics with height has not really been detected.
<5315> Jenkins/MetO:

would you agree that there is no convincing evidence for kilimanjaro glacier
melt being due to recent warming (let alone man-made warming)?
<2292> Jones:

[tropical glaciers] There is a small problem though with their retreat. They
have retreated a lot in the last 20 years yet the MSU2LT data would suggest
that temperatures haven’t increased at these levels.
<1788> Jones:

There shouldn’t be someone else at UEA with different views [from "recent
extreme weather is due to global warming"] – at least not a climatologist.
<4693> Crowley:

I am not convinced that the “truth” is always worth reaching if it is at the
cost of damaged personal relationships
<2967> Briffa:

Also there is much published evidence for Europe (and France in particular) of
increasing net primary productivity in natural and managed woodlands that may
be associated either with nitrogen or increasing CO2 or both. Contrast this
with the still controversial question of large-scale acid-rain-related forest
decline? To what extent is this issue now generally considered urgent, or even
real?
<2733> Crowley:

Phil, thanks for your thoughts – guarantee there will be no dirty laundry in
the open.
<2095> Steig:

He’s skeptical that the warming is as great as we show in East Antarctica — he
thinks the “right” answer is more like our detrended results in the
supplementary text. I cannot argue he is wrong.
<0953> Jones:

This will reduce the 1940-1970 cooling in NH temps. Explaining the cooling with
sulphates won’t be quite as necessary.
<4944> Haimberger:

It is interesting to see the lower tropospheric warming minimum in the tropics
in all three plots, which I cannot explain. I believe it is spurious but it is
remarkably robust against my adjustment efforts.
<4262> Klein/LLNL:

Does anybody have an explanation why there is a relative minimum (and some
negative trends) between 500 and 700 hPa? No models with significant surface
warming do this
<2461> Osborn:

This is an excellent idea, Mike, IN PRINCIPLE at least. In practise, however,
it raises some interesting results [...] the analysis will not likely lie near to
the middle of the cloud of published series and explaining the reasons behind
this etc. will obscure the message of a short EOS piece.
<4470> Norwegian Meteorological Institute:

In Norway and Spitsbergen, it is possible to explain most of the warming after
the 1960s by changes in the atmospheric circulation. The warming prior to 1940
cannot be explained in this way.

/// The Urban Heat Effect ///

<4938> Jenkins/MetO:

By coincidence I also got recently a paper from Rob which says “London’s UHI
has indeed become more intense since the 1960s esp during spring and summer”.
<0896> Jones:

I think the urban-related warming should be smaller than this, but I can’t
think of a good way to argue this. I am hopeful of finding something in the
data that makes by their Figure 3.
<0044> Rean:

[...] we found the [urban warming] effect is pretty big in the areas we analyzed.
This is a little different from the result you obtained in 1990.
[...] We have published a few of papers on this topic in Chinese. Unfortunately,
when we sent our comments to the IPCC AR4, they were mostly rejected.
<4789> Wigley:

there are some nitpicky jerks who have criticized the Jones et al. data sets –
we don’t want one of those [EPRI/California Energy Commission meeting].

Jones:

The jerk you mention was called Good(e)rich who found urban warming at
all Californian sites.
<1601> Jones:

I think China is one of the few places that are affected [urban heat]. The
paper shows that London and Vienna (and also New York) are not affected in the
20th century.
<2939> Jones:

[...] every effort has been made to use data that are either rural and/or where
the urbanization effect has been removed as well as possible by statistical
means. There are 3 groups that have done this independently (CRU, NOAA and
GISS), and they end up with essentially the same results.
[...] Furthermore, the oceans have warmed at a rate consistent with the land.
There is no urban effect there.

/// Temperature Reconstructions ///

<1583> Wilson:

any method that incorporates all forms of uncertainty and error will
undoubtedly result in reconstructions with wider error bars than we currently
have. These many be more honest, but may not be too helpful for model
comparison attribution studies. We need to be careful with the wording I think.
<4165> Jones:

what he [Zwiers] has done comes to a different conclusion than Caspar and Gene!
I reckon this can be saved by careful wording.
<3994> Mitchell/MetO

Is the PCA approach robust? Are the results statistically significant? It seems
to me that in the case of MBH the answer in each is no
<4241> Wilson:

I thought I’d play around with some randomly generated time-series and see if I
could ‘reconstruct’ northern hemisphere temperatures.
[...] The reconstructions clearly show a ‘hockey-stick’ trend. I guess this is
precisely the phenomenon that Macintyre has been going on about.
<3373> Bradley:

I’m sure you agree–the Mann/Jones GRL paper was truly pathetic and should
never have been published. I don’t want to be associated with that 2000 year
“reconstruction”.
<4758> Osborn:

Because how can we be critical of Crowley for throwing out 40-years in the
middle of his calibration, when we’re throwing out all post-1960 data ‘cos the
MXD has a non-temperature signal in it, and also all pre-1881 or pre-1871 data
‘cos the temperature data may have a non-temperature signal in it!
<0886> Esper:

Now, you Keith complain about the way we introduced our result, while saying it
is an important one. [...] the IPCC curve needs to be improved according to
missing long-term declining trends/signals, which were removed (by
dendrochronologists!) before Mann merged the local records together. So, why
don’t you want to let the result into science?
<4369> Cook:

I am afraid that Mike is defending something that increasingly can not be
defended. He is investing too much personal stuff in this and not letting the
science move ahead.
<5055> Cook:

One problem is that he [Mann] will be using the RegEM method, which provides no
better diagnostics (e.g. betas) than his original method. So we will still not
know where his estimates are coming from.

/// Science and Religion ///

<2132> Wigley:

I heard that Zichichi has links with the Vatican. A number of other greenhouse
skeptics have extreme religious views.
<4394> Houghton [MetO, IPCC co-chair]

[...] we dont take seriously enough our God-given responsibility to care for the
Earth [...] 500 million people are expected to watch The Day After Tomorrow. We
must pray that they pick up that message.
<0999> Hulme:

My work is as Director of the national centre for climate change research, a
job which requires me to translate my Christian belief about stewardship of
God’s planet into research and action.
<3653> Hulme:

He [another Met scientist] is a Christian and would talk authoritatively about
the state of climate science from the sort of standpoint you are wanting.

/// Climate Models ///

<3111> Watson/UEA:

I’d agree probably 10 years away to go from weather forecasting to ~ annual
scale. But the “big climate picture” includes ocean feedbacks on all time
scales, carbon and other elemental cycles, etc. and it has to be several
decades before that is sorted out I would think. So I would guess that it will
not be models or theory, but observation that will provide the answer to the
question of how the climate will change in many decades time.
<5131> Shukla/IGES:

["Future of the IPCC", 2008] It is inconceivable that policymakers will be
willing to make billion-and trillion-dollar decisions for adaptation to the
projected regional climate change based on models that do not even describe and
simulate the processes that are the building blocks of climate variability.
<2423> Lanzante/NOAA:

While perhaps one could designate some subset of models as being poorer in a
lot of areas, there probably never will be a single universally superior model
or set of models. We should keep in mind that the climate system is complex, so
that it is difficult, if not impossible to define a metric that captures the
breath of physical processes relevant to even a narrow area of focus.
<1982> Santer:

there is no individual model that does well in all of the SST and water vapor
tests we’ve applied.
<0850> Barnett:

[IPCC AR5 models] clearly, some tuning or very good luck involved. I doubt the
modeling world will be able to get away with this much longer
<5066> Hegerl:

[IPCC AR5 models]
So using the 20th c for tuning is just doing what some people have long
suspected us of doing [...] and what the nonpublished diagram from NCAR showing
correlation between aerosol forcing and sensitivity also suggested.
<4443> Jones:

Basic problem is that all models are wrong – not got enough middle and low
level clouds.
<4085> Jones:

GKSS is just one model and it is a model, so there is no need for it to be
correct.

/// The Cause ///

<3115> Mann:

By the way, when is Tom C going to formally publish his roughly 1500 year
reconstruction??? It would help the cause to be able to refer to that
reconstruction as confirming Mann and Jones, etc.
<3940> Mann:

They will (see below) allow us to provide some discussion of the synthetic
example, referring to the J. Cimate paper (which should be finally accepted
upon submission of the revised final draft), so that should help the cause a
bit.
<0810> Mann:

I gave up on Judith Curry a while ago. I don’t know what she think’s she’s
doing, but its not helping the cause
<3594> Berger:

Phil,
Many thanks for your paper and congratulations for reviving the global warming.
<0121> Jones:

[on temperature data adjustments] Upshot is that their trend will increase
<4184> Jones:

[to Hansen] Keep up the good work! [...] Even though it’s been a mild winter in
the UK, much of the rest of the world seems coolish – expected though given the
La Nina. Roll on the next El Nino!
<5294> Schneider:

Even though I am virtually certain we shall lose on McCain-Lieberman, they are
forcing Senators to go on record for for against sensible climate policy

/// Freedom of Information ///

<2440> Jones:

I’ve been told that IPCC is above national FOI Acts. One way to cover yourself
and all those working in AR5 would be to delete all emails at the end of the
process
<2094> Briffa:

UEA does not hold the very vast majority of mine [potentially FOIable emails]
anyway which I copied onto private storage after the completion of the IPCC
task.
<2459> Osborn:

Keith and I have just searched through our emails for anything containing
“David Holland”. Everything we found was cc’d to you and/or Dave Palmer, which
you’ll already have.
<1473> McGarvie/UEA Director of Faculty Administration:

As we are testing EIR with the other climate audit org request relating to
communications with other academic colleagues, I think that we would weaken
that case if we supplied the information in this case. So I would suggest that
we decline this one (at the very end of the time period)
<1577> Jones:

[FOI, temperature data]
Any work we have done in the past is done on the back of the research grants we
get – and has to be well hidden. I’ve discussed this with the main funder (US
Dept of Energy) in the past and they are happy about not releasing the original
station data.