Weblog Commenting and Trackback by HaloScan.com The Barnyard: June 2008

Monday, June 30, 2008

More Oil In Alaska Than Saudi Arabia

I keep up with this issue as best I can and this the first I have heard of the Gull Island find, it appears Alaska may have more oil and natural gas than we have been lead to believe. Heck combine this with the Green River and Bakken formations and America has far more oil than the Middle East and I say we should be going after it! It would keep hundreds of billions of dollars in the US economy and generate hundreds of thousands new high paying jobs. A big hattip to Michael Yost at the Common Conservative for posting this.

This is the first of eight in the series on the energy non-crisis the rest can be found here. I have no reason to doubt this just based on my own limited research. We need to Drill Here, Drill Now and Pay Less, the polar bears, caribou and mosquitos will get over it just fine.

He predicts the gas prices we have today a year and a half ago and I agree with him and I am not a conspiracy theorist by any means. Watch these videos and know what I have been writing about for months is true.

He is a bit Bircheresque but he does make alot of sense.

The "Golden" Road In California To Not Travel

Rancho Seco now sits dormant, a symbol of California's failed enrgy policy.
Many like to say that my state of California leads the nation and where we go the rest are sure to follow. Well one place the rest of the states should never follow us is in the field of energy production. The environmental lobby has all but paralyzed our ability to produce our own electricity so we rely on surrounding states to provide the energy we need and the resulting high prices are driving industry and with it the jobs they provide out of the state. The ecogeeks won't let us burn coal for power, use nuclear power and even fight wind and solar production. We probably have enough natural gas off our coast to power us for years but nope we can't tap that. We have areas that could be tapped for geo-thermal production, can't do that either. We can't build wind farms because they spoil the view and kill birds and can't build solar installations in our desert because it might hurt a few rats and tortoises and the transmission lines are ugly. We can't use hydro-electric because it hurts salmon and swallows pretty valleys. It goes on and on and our idiots in Sacramento suck it up like kool-aid including our Gubernator Ahnuld, hypocrite supreme, while he commutes between LA and Sacramento in his private jet and drives humvees.
Anyway this article by Max Shultz will give you a good idea why it is not wise to follow the path the Golden State has when it comes to energy. This is all done in the name of saving the planet while there are a couple thousand wildfires every summer as result of other failed evironmentalist policies but that is another topic.

California’s Potemkin Environmentalism
A celebrated green economy produces pollution elsewhere, ongoing power shortages, and business-crippling costs.
In January 2007, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger stood before the California legislature in Sacramento and delivered his fourth State of the State address since his improbable 2003 election. It was a rhetorical tour de force that would win him widespread acclaim. “California has the ideas of Athens and the power of Sparta,” said Schwarzenegger. “Not only can we lead California into the future; we can show the nation and the world how to get there.”

As the saying goes, read the whole thing.

All That Is Old Is New Again

Forty years ago radical student groups took to the streets to protest against the Vietnam war and the Establishment and staged violent protests at the Democrat's National Convention in Chicago while shutting down university campuses across the country. Back then they largely rejected politics in favor sex, drugs, rock and roll and blowing things up but since then many of the leaders have mellowed out and become professors, actors and even politicians. So what are all those radicals from the '60s up to today when they are not attempting to brainwash our youth as their teachers? Well they are supporting and campaigning for Barack Obama. So why do all these aging hippy communists and anarchists now support Obama so fervently? Do they believe that he is one of them in thought and policy? Obama has admitted in his books that he sought out these types while in college and has surrounded himself with radicals ever since.
Daniel Flynn has a must read piece in City Journal that looks into the leaders and history of those radical student groups from the '60s and their connections to Obama today, Ayers and Dohrn are just to tip of the iceberg. They know the American people won't go for socialists or communists so they now call themselves progressives in the hope of pulling the wool over our ideas so they can regressively change America for the worse. Yep that is the hope and change you can believe in. Here is a snippet but you should really read the whole thing.

Progressives for Obama resembles a Who’s Who of SDS luminaries. In addition to Hayden, Rudd, and Davidson, the group includes Bob Pardun, SDS’s education secretary during the 1966–67 school year; Paul Buhle, a radical professor who has recently attempted to revive SDS; Mickey and Dick Flacks, red-diaper babies who helped craft 1962’s Port Huron Statement, a seminal New Left document; and SDS’s third president, Todd Gitlin. Age and experience have mellowed some of the SDSers in Obama’s camp. Gitlin, for instance, has evolved into a respected Ivy League professor and milquetoast liberal. But others still glory in a past that can only damage Obama’s future. The aging New Left still practices a therapeutic politics that places a higher value on feelings of personal liberation than on restrained pursuit of political aims.

Plus many of today's radical anti-war groups like the Code Pinkos are backing Obama and planning massive demonstrations for this years DNC in Denver.
(HT:Gateway Pundit)

Sunday, June 29, 2008

Drilling In ANWR

Pamela Gellar has some great pictures of ANWR posted as well as some interesting graphics about the scope of the area that they want to drill in. The Democrats are lieing to us once again about why they refuse to drill. Al Gore once suggested that the government should artificialy raise the price of gas to get people out of their cars and into public transportation to save the planet from those awful greenhouse gasses. They don't give a flying rat's ass about the environment or poor people they just want to control where we live, work and how we get there. They want to crowd everybody into big cities and make them dependent on the government for everything, in a few words, communist totalitarianism. They want all the power, yes, the Democrats have become the party of the elite that doesn't care a wit about us poor, bitter, working class slobs, that cling to our guns and Bibles, after all we are just their serfs to be taxed into submission so they can lord over us. They claim to be for the little people but that has to be the biggest bunch of hogwash I have ever heard.
It is time for us great unwashed masses to pull the wool from over over our eyes and see the truth about what the kleptocrats, er Democrats really want and vote them out of office for good.

Ralph Peters On Iraq And Moonbat Lies


Via Gateway Pundit who points to a great article by Ralph in the NYP that shatters 7 of the favorite talking points of the barking moonbats like "we are less safe now", AQ is stronger than ever" and "we are losing in Iraq". He systematicly takes them apart piece by piece and leaves them in a pile of rubble like a blown up AQ safehouse. Here is a taste of his "Liars Round Up" but go read the whole thing.

THE facts about your security are being torn to shreds by activist liars. And they think that you're too stupid to know the difference.

Let's lay out the worst current examples of media make-believe and election-year truth-trashing:

Whopper No. 1: America is less safe today than it was on Sept. 10, 2001. Oh, really? Where's the evidence? The Clinton years saw New York City attacked and Americans slaughtered by terrorists around the globe. Nothing was done to protect us.

And the true end of the Clinton era came on 9/11.

A record to be proud of.

Countless aspects of the Bush-Cheney administration deserve merciless criticism. But fair is fair: Since 9/11, we haven't suffered a single successful terrorist attack on our homeland. Not one.

Explain to me, please, how this shows we're less safe. What factual measurement applies, other than the absence of attacks?

God knows, the terrorists desperately wanted to strike our homeland. And they couldn't. Are we supposed to believe that was an accident?

Everyone thought we would get hit again and again after 9/11 but we haven't instead we liberated 30 million people from the grasp of terror and drove them into holes in the rugged mountainous border region of Pakistan and Afghanistan or killed them by the thousands. In fact the Iraqi government has passed more major legislation than our Congress has and have you noticed the Democrats have even stopped talking about those "benchmarks" that the surge was supposed to bring. Heck even the NYT has had to acknowledge the success in Iraq albeit with plenty of negative caveats.

Saturday, June 28, 2008

Another Global Warming Myth Debuked

Several MSM outlets have been trumpeting the hysterical story that the North Pole may melt free of ice this summer after recovering over the winter because of anthropogenic global warming. Well if global air temperatures have not increased over the last decade and in fact have declined in the last couple years why is the Arctic sea ice melting? There are a couple reasons, one being a decadel oscillation of sea currents at the pole that move ice around and another is a massive series of underwater volcanic eruptions that started in 1999 are warming the water under the ice. Simply put air temperatures in the polar regions rarely ever go above freezing so how could atmospheric warming melt the ice but if the water under the ice warms a few degrees melting would accelerate. Well the Democrats better hurry up and ban those volcanoes before they hurt any polar bears.
(HT: David Hinz)
More here about Alaska's cold summer so far and more about those pesky volcanoes via Icecap.

An international team of researchers was able to provide evidence of explosive volcanism in the deeps of the ice-covered Arctic Ocean for the first time. Researchers from an expedition to the Gakkel Ridge, led by the American Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), report in the current issue of the journal Nature that they discovered, with a specially developed camera, extensive layers of volcanic ash on the seafloor, which indicates a gigantic volcanic eruption.

LOL, Bubba Is Pissed

Bill Clinton says Obama will have to"kiss his ass" if he wants Bill's support. I guess he didn't take to kindly to be called a racist by the Obama camp, so much for unity. Gateway Pundit reports that over 100 websites have been set up by disgruntled Clintonites to oppose Obama and Obama supporters are resorting to totalitarian tactics and are trying to shut down anti-Obama blogs.

Americans Reject Socialism

With all the hype over the success of the Obama campaign many commentators have wondered if the country has shifted dramatically to the left but a new Gallup poll shows that not to be the case it appears. Americans soundly reject the idea of the redistribution of wealth 85-13 and that government does too much meddling in our lives 50-43. This would explain why Obama has tacked hard back to the center once he secured the nomination and McCain has even moved more to the right. America is still a center right country that believes in individual liberty and the American dream. Only the Democrats want government to do more while Republicans and independants want the government to do less this should bde well for McCain and the GOP if they stick to the platform that has served them so well of lower taxes and smaller more efficient government.
In a related item JR Dunn has an interesting look at the American left and why they are rejected by most outside of academia and a few big city enclaves. He breaks down the three segments of lefty thought into the wimp left that wants to feel good, the weird left of conspiracy cranks and the hard left of socialist academia. He then goes on to examine how Obama seemingly represents all three of these factions with the soothing rhetoric of hope and change for the wimps, and his long time associations with Wright and Ayers rounding up the other factions. Obama is not mainstream or moderate but a hard core lefty socialist and as more and more people start to see Obama for what he really is, a typical lefty politician, his support will plummet. That is why he did not get a big bump in the polls after Clinton finally conceded and McCain remains very competitive in what should have been a strong year for Democrats.

Friday, June 27, 2008

Obama's Ties To Chicago Slumlord Corruption


Barack Obama has long supported giving taxpayer money to private developers to build and maintain affordable housing in Chicago but just how well has that worked out? One of those developers is of course Tony Rezko whose properties quickly deteriated after they were built for lack of maintenance. Obama also has on staff currently some former managers of those failed projects and worked for a law firm that defended those raunchy developers from complaints brought by citizen groups about the poor state of repair of those projects. The Boston Globe, hardly a right wing rag, has a lengthy expose` that delves into all the ties Obama has to these developers and the people who managed these failed properties many of which are in Obama's former Illinois Senate district. It sure doesn't look like Obama gives a rat's ass about his constituents once he gains a seat of power to actually do something to help beyond further enrichening his circle of friends with taxpayer money. This is a must read article and kudos to Binnyamin Appelbaum for an excellent bit of true investigative journalism.

The squat brick buildings of Grove Parc Plaza, in a dense neighborhood that Barack Obama represented for eight years as a state senator, hold 504 apartments subsidized by the federal government for people who can't afford to live anywhere else.

But it's not safe to live here.

Here is the bit on those working for Obama's presidential campaign.

Campaign finance records show that six prominent developers - including Jarrett, Davis, and Rezko - collectively contributed more than $175,000 to Obama's campaigns over the last decade and raised hundreds of thousands more from other donors. Rezko alone raised at least $200,000, by Obama's own accounting.

Registration may be required to read the whole article but it only takes a second and is worth it so go read the whole thing.
HTs: American Thinker and Rick Moran
Update: More at Protein Wisdom
and at the Campaign Spot

Thursday, June 26, 2008

Democrats Love To Spend Your Money

The cleanest, most ethical, most open Congress ever was the platforn the Pelosi/Reid act ran on to gain the majority in '06 but they are failing on every single issue. The latest Gallup poll only finds a 12% approval rating over their out of control spending of our tax dollars and various scandals the MSM is loath to cover like all those special loans to powerful Democrat Senators by a mortgage company seeking a bailout. Rep. John Campbell(R) is keeping tabs and reports on all the pork in recent funding bills that have come through the House.

This morning Citizens Against Government Waste released its preliminary report of 6 of the House’s appropriations bills, and already earmarks are at a higher level than that of last year. But you don’t have to take my word for it, look for yourself.
Commerce, Justice, Science: CAGW has documented 1,123 projects at a cost of $409.8 million.
Energy & Water: CAGW found 655 projects at a cost of $821 million.
Financial Services: There are 197 projects costing $57 million, which represents a 45 percent increase in projects and an 84 percent increase in dollar amounts from CAGW’s calculation for the fiscal year 2008 House bill.
Interior: For fiscal year 2009, CAGW has enumerated 247 projects at a cost of $134.9 million. In fiscal year 2008, CAGW found 226 projects worth $111 million in the House bill. The 2009 totals represent a 9.3 percent increase in projects and a 21.5 percent increase in dollar amount from 2008.
Labor/HHS: For fiscal year 2009, CAGW calculated that there are 1,370 earmarks at a cost of $618.8 million. In fiscal year 2008, CAGW found 1,305 projects costing $277.9 million in the House bill. The number of projects increased by 5 percent, but the dollar amount jumped by a whopping 122 percent.
Military Construction: CAGW found 102 earmarks costing $621.3 million.

Obama's Global Poverty Act, Senate Bill 2433

This ludicrous bill sponsored and written by Barack Obama would give the UN an additional 845 billion taxpayer dollars above our current foreign aid to redistribute to kleptocrats and the world's poor is coming up for vote in the Senate after the July 4th break. I swear the Democrats are constantly complaining about crumbling infrastructure here in America but they want redistribute all that money to the nefariously corrupt thieves at the UN. It is not their freaking money, it is our hard earned tax dollars meant to run the US not the UN's to spend/waste as they see fit. How would the Democrats pay for this boondoggle? They would reach ever deeper into the American taxpayer's pocket with forced confiscation of the fruits of our labor, communism in a word.
Now I understand that there is brutal poverty in parts of the world but that is not the fault of the American worker nor his/her responsibility to pay for it. It is the responsibility and fault of corrupt dictators in those countries for the dismal living conditions of their citizens, Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe and Kim Jong Ill of No. Korea come to mind. The world community can do more to help those in impoverished nations by supporting freedom and basic human rights than redistributing billions of dollars from free democratic nations to the kleptocrats of oppressive regimes or the UN. The old saying fits well here; teach a man to fish/farm and he feeds himself for life, give him a fish/grain and he eats for a day.
Hattip to The American Thinker which has more here and here. I also wrote about this a while back and pointed out some of the more disturbing parts of this bill such as UN control over US taxation to support this and support of the UN's plans to disarm private citizens. Here are some of the links from that post, here and here.
Contact your Senator and tell them to oppose this rape of the US taxpayer and US sovereignty

SCOTUS Overturns DC Gun Ban

In a victory for Second ammendment rights the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that indeed the right to keep and bear arms is an individual right not a collective one and that outright gun bans are unconstitutional. This just another reason to support John McCain as the Justices he would support are in the mold of those in the majority and Obama likes those in the minority and is a gun control advocate himself. Roberts, Kennedy, Alito, Thomas and Scalia were in the majority with Scalia writing the opinion with Breyer, Stevens, Ginsberg and Souter in the minority.
In other news the NRA is already going after similar bans in Chicago.

Alaska Governor Sarah Palin On Drilling In ANWR


(HT: Hotair)
This is the first time I have heard her speak since her name has been floated as a possible VP pick for McCain and all I can say is wow. Like Bobby Jindal she is another rising star in the GOP that I could easily support. The transcript of her interview with Larry Kudlow can be found here if your browser has trouble with Red Lasso as I know some do.

Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Support The Troops For Real

This will be live from 4:00 till midnight tomorrow Eastern time in the single largest blog run fundraiser ever to send care packages to our troops over seas.


< a href="http://www.ustream.tv" style="padding:2px 0px 4px; width:400px; background:#FFFFFF; display:block; color:#000000; font-weight:normal; font-size:10px; text-decoration:underline; text-align:center;” target="_blank">Streaming Video by Ustream.TV


Many conservative icons will be holding court so tune in and send in a dollar or two if you can.
There is a code problem somewhere that I can't fix so I hope the stream works, if not you can go to Michelle Malkin's site for it.

The Enemy Of My Enemy

I don't normally link to lefty sites but these two are actually readable because they oppose Obama as much as those of us on the right side of the political divide do. The split in the Democrats is very real and can't be painted over by a MSM with a tingle up its collective leg. I point you to Liberal Rapture and No Quarter, two Clintonista sites that are actually fun reads. I probably disagree with them on every policy issue but we agree on one thing Obama is a fake poseur put up by the elites in the DNC and will be horrible for the country if elected. The Obamassiah has no clothes. Heck the vitriol coming from some lefty sites is far more than I have seen in any right wing blog. How will the neophyte community organizer respond when he is getting hit from the left and right? He can't move to the center or his far left base will hammer him and he will never get votes from right leaners so he is stuck between the rock and a hard left stance. I doubt there is much more room under that bus before it loses all the traction it had.

John McCain Lays Out His Energy Plan

Most of it is fairly solid and includes all the obvious such as more domestic exploration for oil and gas, clean coal technology, and nuclear power. Now if we could just get him to shut up about cap and trade schemes that are bound to be riddled with bureaucratic boondoggles and the corresponding corruption that anything involving government regulation usually entails. Europe has enacted cap and trade policies and has failed to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions as much as the US has since the Kyoto Accord, they are signees, we are not but somehow we are still cleaner than they are without the overly costly regulatory burden. The free market works as demand for clean technology increases, research and development expands in order to increase supply.
I have priced solar power for the barnyard since I get ample sun living in the Sacramento valley and a southern facing roofline but right now it would cost about $17,000 and that would take about 30 years to pay for itself so it is not worth it. I did put state of the art insulation in my attic, the same as used in space suits, and that has helped cut my air conditioning bill in half. The technology in solar power is advancing rapidly as demand grows and possibly in a very few years the cost vs benefit line will be crossed so that it makes fiscal sense to install a solar power system. I would love to be off the grid and not subject to the whims of politicians seeking to regulate us out of the cheap energy provided by coal burning plants. Eventhough I do not buy into the global warming scam I am all for clean and green technology that limits actual pollution, carbon dioxide is no more a pollutant than dihydrogen monoxide, oxygen or nitrogen are and all are vital natural gasses in our atmosphere that keeps us alive. In case you are wondering dihydrogen monoxide, H2O, has a far stronger warming influence than carbon dioxide as anyone that lives in a humid climate can attest to. Heck right now there are so many wildfires burning in California it has the effect of filtering out direct sunshine and is keeping the temperatures below normal for this time of year. Those fires are also putting more carbon into the air than industry or SUVs ever will but that is another subject where the environuts have also been totally wrong for the past fifty years.

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Even Lefty Tool Mocks Obama

Sorta funny, it's ok to laugh at Obama.

Ten Good Reasons To Oppose Barack Obama

Last week His Hopeness predicted that the GOP is going to try and scare people with his funny name and his race which is actually far below the standards the GOP holds itself to and particularly John McCain. Why should we when it is a great reflection on America that a person of mixed race has become the presumptive POTUS nominee for one of our two great political parties. As I have written before I am sure that there is a tiny percentage of people that will or will not vote for him on that basis there is no reason to use that as a plank to play against him when his policies offer plenty of other reasons. He simply does not have the experience in foreign policy, economics or even domestic policy and lacks the backbone to even stand by his own words.
Bill Bennett and Set Liebsohn lay out ten of those concerns in much detail in this must read piece in National Review. Here are the ten areas that they go into extensive detail to cover, bold script is their's, my comment is in normal script.

1. Barack Obama’s foreign policy is dangerous, naïve, and betrays a profound misreading of history. Hillary even pointed this out in an early debate.
2. Barack Obama’s Iraq policy will hand al-Qaeda a victory and undercut our entire position in the Middle East, while at the same time put a huge source of oil in the hands of terrorists. He is an appeaser of radical islam.
3. Barack Obama has sent mixed, confusing, and inconsistent messages on his policy toward Israel. He has been all over the place on his Middle Eastern policy and has lots of shady palestinian friends like Khalidi and Said plus the Woods Fund sent tens of thousands of dollars to the PLO when he was on their board.
4. In the primary campaign, Barack Obama consistently campaigned against NAFTA, but has now changed his tune, as he has with other issues. I believe free trade benefits both countries involved by opening markets to goods and services.
5. Barack Obama’s judgment about personal and professional affiliations is more than troubling. It is a long list Ayers, Dohrn, Khalidi, Said, Pfleger, Farrakhan, Wright, Rezko, just to name a few.
6. Obama is simply out of step with how terrorists should be handled; he would turn back the clock on how we fight terrorism, using the failed strategy of the 1990s as opposed to the post-9/11 strategy that has kept us safe. He supports the recent SCOTUS decision that gives terrorists the same access to our court system as US citizens and then justifies it with comparisons to the Nuremburg tribunals that were conducted by th e militaries of the Allies after WWII.
7. Barack Obama’s economic policies would hurt the economy. Well DUH, raising taxes on the productive kills incentive to be productive. He believes in the communist mantra , from each according to ability to each according to need.
8. Barack Obama opposes drilling on and offshore to reduce gas and oil prices. Now that is just plain stupid when we sit on more oil than the Middle East and are still a long ways from a viable alternative source of energy, he also buys into the global warming hype. Unfortunately so does McCain but at least McCain is open to drilling and nuclear power.
9. Barack Obama is to the left of Hillary Clinton and NARAL on the issue of life. He voted against the partial birth murder ban and against the born alive act while McCain has a 100% prolife record.
10. Barack Obama is actually to the left of every member of the U.S. Senate. His idea of post partisanship is forcing conservatives to cave into his hopey change to socialism and big government control of every aspect of our lives.

Bill and Seth go into much more detail than I do without the snarkiness so go read the whole article. Fellow conservatives it is time to get over your problems with McCain, I share them, we simply cannot let Obama anywhere near the White House.

Monday, June 23, 2008

Iraqis Skunk US

This is a super positive story of what is really happening on the ground in Iraq while there are still some hotspots a US team was able to shed their body armor for soccer uniforms and take on a local club team. They whooped us good but that is not the point, the fact that they were able to have this friendly match is. This is a great developement considering this area was once over run by Al Qaeda, I can't believe McClatchy news actually covered it but they did, kudos to them.

A soccer game on a dirt field between two amateur teams_ one U.S. Army soldiers, one local Iraqis — may not seem like a big deal in the scope of the wider war.

Especially when it's a blow-out by the Iraqis; when both teams are playing in running shoes, not cleats; when the nets are thin blue mesh; and when only a couple hundred fans brave the 108-degree temperature in this town due west of Kirkuk.

But the recent match between members of the 87th Infantry's 1st battalion and several young men from the Sons of Iraq meant much more than the 9-0 score.

For one thing, it was the third time in recent days when American soldiers donned shorts and "Salute to Our Fallen Heroes" T-shirts to go head-to-head and foot-to-foot with teams of opponents who, only months ago, may have been trying to kill them.

In other news from Iraq the once "lost" Anbar province will be turned over to Iraqi control in a few days. This is the same province that contains Ramadi and Fallujah also former AQ strongholds as part of the notorious Sunni triangle. We have made so much incredible progress in Iraq thet even the MSM can no longer ignore it.

Good Web Ad From The NRSC


HT: Hotair

Sunday, June 22, 2008

Common Sense On Climate Change

Bjorn Lomborg may be one of the clearest thinkers there is on the topic of climate change where the debate can become extremely heated between the deniers and the global warming doomsayers. He acknowledges that man is at least partly responsible for warming but not entirely and that there are many steps that can be taken that cost far less and produce much better returns than those advocated by folks like Al Gore. He would rather see the money spent where it could do the most good even it does not immediately cut greenhouse gas emissions such as helping to mitigate the effects such warming might have. He does not see a few degrees of warming as disastrous if steps are taken to adapt to those conditions instead of the economy killing measures that would have very negligible effect on the climate but cost trillions of dollars.
He makes a lot of sense and he should be listened to carefully as the debate goes forward as to what to do. He sat down with KJ Lopez of National Review for a must read interview that gave John McCain some very good advice on what he should do if elected. It is unlikely that Obama would listen since the Democrats see the issue as a way to increase big government control over our lives whether their solutions would work or not. McCain at least understands that nuclear power is a big part of what we can do for a clean source of energy, the Democrats remain highly opposed to it.
Lomborg has another interview here with The Spectator and it hits on many of the same points as the NRO one does but I liked this part about the alarmists and their screeching of doom.

“Unlike proper climate change sceptics (who are the equivalent, George Monbiot has famously claimed, of Holocaust deniers), Lomborg says his views on global warming are broadly in sympathy with those of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Where he thinks the green movement has got things badly wrong is in attempting to shut down any form of critical opposition. ‘You cannot have a conversation about the biggest policy argument of the day, and then say that one side isn’t allowed to debate,’ says Lomborg. He thinks the greens have also done their cause a great disservice by talking up the climate change threat. ‘You can overplay your cards and screech so loudly that you end up losing the argument.’ The battle for common sense, though, is far from over. His worry is that the next Kyoto update — the Copenhagen summit in 2009 — will prove yet another wasted opportunity where politicians set themselves ever higher pie-in-the-sky targets on carbon emissions. ‘The danger is not that we’re not going to meet these targets, because I take that as granted — of course we’re not going to meet them, just as we didn’t after Kyoto in 1997. What’s far worse, is that yet again, it will stop us focusing on all the incredible things we actually could do with that money. So we end up wasting another ten or 20 years.’”

I still remain in the strongly skeptical camp but if the politicians think something must be done I hope they pay attention to what Lomborg has to say.

Saturday, June 21, 2008

Changing Facts and Outdated Narratives

Michael Barone's latest on "Changing Facts" and outdated narratives is a must read with the Iraq war going in the right direction and fuel prices in the wrong one the Republicans can now turn things around. The Democrats now caught in their moonbat web of anti-war zombies, global warming zealots and econuts have a big problem on their hands as the Pelosi/Reid led Congress has led them to the lowest approval ratings in history. Now if the GOP can just capitalize on it 2008 may not be as bad as many feared. The Democrat's nutroots base is going apoplectic over the passing of the FISA bill and the latest war spending bill plus to make matters worse Barack is failing to amend the rifts between him and Hillary's supporters.
With people feeling the pain at the pump and the ripple effect in other sectors of the economy Democrats refusing to allow domestic exploration and Republicans supporting it we have been handed a massive cudgel to beat them soundly with, let the battle begin.

The Audacity Of Hope Or The Audacity Of Arrogance

Obama rolled out his new logo while speaking to a gathering of the Democrat Governors earlier this week with a little creative presumption that teeters on legality. This totally reeks of an arrogant entitlement mentality that has come to permeate his campaign over the last few weeks. Have the massive swooning crowds and record setting fundraising gone to his head just a little?
Just last week he decided to forgo the public financing system for his general election campaign after making promise after promise that he would accept those funds and the limitations that go with them. His reasoning was that he needed to be able to overcome the nonexistant vast right wing attack machine. The ironic part is that it appears the wheels have come of his fundraising juggernaut only barely outraising McCain in the month of May while the RNC crushed the DNC.
He has even pulled out the race card already saying those evil racist Republicans are going to try and scare people because he has a funny name and is black. Sorry Barry, you have enough other faults and failings that we weren't even thinking about that line of attack. We are going to paint you as the radical left wing communist that you are and tie you to the corruption that permeates Chicago politics starting with all your radical associates and long time friends. Your skin color has nothing to do with it or your funny name, besides that you are a walking talking gaffe machine that makes stuff up out of thin air with no grasp of actual history. You have zero new ideas just typical old failed liberal boilerplate delivered with a smooth speaking style devoid of substance. So much for all that hopey change for a new kind of politics, plus ce change plus ce le meme chose. The more that things change the more they stay the same.

Connecting The Dots Of Obama's Change On Iraq

The pieces of the story are finally coming together about Obama's continually shifting changes of his stances on Iraq and they are all tied to his long time friend Tony Rezko. First we learned that Rezko was tied to all sorts of shady housing deals in Chicago including helping in the purchase of the Obamas' own multi-million dollar domicile. Now we learn about where the money was coming from, former bagman for Saddam Hussein, Nahdmi Auchi, and former Iraqi Minister of Electricity, Aiham Alsamarrae, now wanted for embezzling millions by the Iraqi government. Rezko had a contract to build a power plant in the Kurdish region of Iraq but had no money to do it so Auchi got Alsamarrae, Rezko's college roommate to give him a letter of credit from the Iraqi government. The deal fell apart when Alsamarrae was convicted of corruption and jailed.
To see how all this ties into Obama's constant changes of his stances on the war go read this outstanding article by Richard Fernandez that breaks down the time lines of what Obama has said in the past and when these events occurred. It looks like Obama hoped to enrich his friends as a result of the war. I guess all that hope and change had a real purpose after all.

Barack Obama’s position on Iraq has shifted significantly over the last six years. What is interesting is how his position on Iraq matches up with developments in Chicago. Specifically, there appears to be a direct correlation between the rising and falling prospects of his longtime friend and fundraiser Tony Rezko’s attempts to secure multi-million-dollar contracts to build and operate a power plant in Kurdish Iraq and the senator’s Iraq flip-flops.

Chicago and Middle Eastern sleaze all wrapped up in one big sticky ball with Barack right in the middle. He sure doesn't look like some sort of enlightened post modern messiah from this angle just another corrupt Chicago pol.

Friday, June 20, 2008

Friday Fun

Via Hotair is this funny clip of GOP Rep. Thad McCotter with a lecture on how to translate Democrats. I wonder what they were debating in the House when he did this.

Then via Jawa Report is a jihadi bloober clip of a failed attack, they toss a grenade at a humvee, miss and run like scared chickens clucking loudly. I guess AQ is reduced to recruiting morons, real ones not the AoSHQ type.

Thursday, June 19, 2008

A Mummified Dinosaur In North Dakota

Whoa, now this grabbed my attention since I have been fascinated by dinosaurs since I was old enough to read. This is only the fourth such find ever and is the most complete with fossilized skin and all. This will definately give paleontologists a far better idea of what the massive lizards would have looked like.

Using tiny brushes and chisels, workers picking at a big greenish-black rock in the basement of North Dakota's state museum are meticulously uncovering something amazing: a nearly complete dinosaur, skin and all.

Unlike almost every other dinosaur fossil ever found, the Edmontosaurus named Dakota, a duckbilled dinosaur unearthed in southwestern North Dakota in 2004, is covered by fossilized skin that is hard as iron. It's among just a few mummified dinosaurs in the world, say the researchers who are slowly freeing it from a 65-million-year-old rock tomb.

"This is the closest many people will ever get to seeing what large parts of a dinosaur actually looked like, in the flesh," said Phillip Manning, a paleontologist at Manchester University in England, a member of the international team researching Dakota.

Very Awesome Robot War Porn

I-robot teamed up with Metal Storm to create another amazing tool for our armed forces, a robot that can be armed with the million rounds-a-minute electric machine gun. Just what we need to patrol the border, clean out hobo camps ans send into terrorist ratholes in Afghanistan and Iraq. Yeah, I love these types weapons like our drones that send Hellfire to the jihadi scum.

The as yet unnamed war bot is being marketed for "border patrol" and "crowd control" scenarios, although other military situations are also under consideration.
"We want our soldiers to have the option of controlling a robot that could go ahead and investigate, engage or deter an enemy and not put human soldiers at risk," said a spokesman for Metal Storm who wished to remain anonymous.
This new war bot will likely soon join the existing ranks of military robots deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The U.S. military has used various war bots, from both iRobot and its competitor Foster-Miller, for years, primarily to diffuse bombs and other unexploded ordinances.
The first armed robots appeared in Iraq in 2007 as part of Foster-Miller's SWORDS program. They were armed with M249 light machine guns and received limited service in Iraq.

Hey anyway we can kill the enemy and keep our boys safer I am all for it. I guess those gamers out there have a useful purpose afterall since the robots are remote controlled.

Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Not Stopping Child Killer Justified!?!

Whisky Tango Foxtrot, I know my readers have seen the story about a toddler being stomped to death here in California before the killer was rightly taken out by the police. What gets me is numerous witnesses did nothing, NOTHING beyond using their cellphones!!! I know if I saw something like that happening the f^^cker would have one very hulkified goat on his ass like stink on shit. I am damn sure not scared of some punk beating a child, heck I have been shot at tearing down illegal deer stands and had a gun in my face during an attempted home invasion and I am still here without a scar. I would have hit the guy like an NFL linebacker with a grudge to settle, I do not doubt that about myself, I act. In my opinion people like that deserve to beaten to a pulp.

Al Gore Hypocrite Of The Year Again

While Al Gore jets around the world lambasting normal folks on the evils of energy use and hyping anthropogenic global warming as the doomsday of all life on earth unless we go live in caves and live on bugs and nuts, his house still uses more electricity per month than the average house in a year. The funniest part is despite his efforts to make his mansion more green it still is not as green as President Bush's modest sized ranch house in Crawford, Texas.

After the Tennessee Center for Policy Research exposed Gore’s massive home energy use, the former Vice President scurried to make his home more energy-efficient. Despite adding solar panels, installing a geothermal system, replacing existing light bulbs with more efficient models, and overhauling the home’s windows and ductwork, Gore now consumes more electricity than before the “green” overhaul.

Since taking steps to make his home more environmentally-friendly last June, Gore devours an average of 17,768 kWh per month –1,638 kWh more energy per month than before the renovations – at a cost of $16,533. By comparison, the average American household consumes 11,040 kWh in an entire year, according to the Energy Information Administration.

In the wake of becoming the most well-known global warming alarmist, Gore won an Oscar, a Grammy and the Nobel Peace Prize. In addition, Gore saw his personal wealth increase by an estimated $100 million thanks largely to speaking fees and investments related to global warming hysteria.
“Actions speak louder than words, and Gore’s actions prove that he views climate change not as a serious problem, but as a money-making opportunity,” Johnson said. “Gore is exploiting the public’s concern about the environment to line his pockets and enhance his profile.”

Hattip to Planet Gore where they also point out that while it may take a few years to take advantage of the massive oil reserves in this country it will still be way before an alternative to oil can be accomplished and the infrastructure in place to use it. Many people don't realize that many other products we use every day are oil based products besides gas and motor oil from the plastic industry, to asphalt, to cosmetics, to nylon and polyester. They also don't take into account that batteries to power electric cars also consume resources far more rare and harder to process than oil while consuming far more energy and with emissions just as dangerous as those put out by oil refineries. Plus those ores like nickel, lead, cadmium, and lithium must be mined from somewhere with far more environmental damage than drilling for oil. Oil, natural gas and coal will be the staple of our energy for several decades to come before an alternative can be developed and put in place so we might as well face up to that fact soon. There is no silver bullet cure for that fact so Drill, Drill, Drill !!!
The second biggest hypocrite is California Gov Schwartzeneger who rides around in Hummers and commutes between Sacramento and Las Angeles everyday in a private jet because he prefers to live in his posh mansion. When those that preach follow their own words then matbe people will believe them untill then they are the definition of hypocritical liars.

YAY!!! Mary Katharine Ham Is Blogging Again

She has started her new job for the Examiner and is back in the blogosphere with her new site and is as fiesty as ever.

I Have Never Forgotten You


My heart sank as I read the news this morning. Henryk Mandelbaum, Poland's last surviving Sonderkommando (Jews who were forced to man the Nazi gas chambers) passed away on Tuesday at the age of 85. Mandelbaum was forced as a prisoner to strip victims' bodies of their valuables, pull out their gold teeth and fillings and carry them to crematoria for burning. It makes me very sad to think that the survivors who keep the memory of the Holocaust alive are slowly disappearing. Without Mandelbaum, who will be able to teach the world about the gas chambers, the Sonderkommando, about the Holocaust? Will we allow the horrors of our past to simple fade away and turn to dust?

I recently came back from an amazing trip in Poland and Israel, to commemorate our tragic past and to affirm our glorious future. I sat in synagogues and yeshivot that once housed thousands of Jewish worshippers and students and now sit emtpy. Krakow's beautifully decorated and extremely ornate Tempel Shul is unused for most of the year. In Lublin, a city which was once refered to as the Jerusalem of Poland, if one did not know to look for a Jewish cemetary or synagogue, one would have no idea that Jews once lived there. In Poland, I noticed how easy it was to forget. In Placzow work camp, a park was created out of the mass grave. On the bones of 20 000 Jews (one of the survivors who accompanied us on our trip explained to us that her cousin of 6 was shot right were we stood), Poles sunbathe and walk their dogs. The distance between Auschwitz and Birkenau is flanked with restaurants and shops. Majdanek, certainly the most evil place on Earth, is 5 minuted from the center of Lublin. Inhabitted houses sit at the edge of the barbed wire, standing while its horrible furnaces burnt human flesh. In Warsaw, nothing of the ghetto remains besides two walls. The area was rebuilt and today is full of apartments and stores. In Umschlagplatz, the train depot from which 300 000 Jews were taken to the gas chambers at Treblinka, these tracks now carry tour trolleys and cable cars. While we emersed ourselves bitterly in the pain of our people over 60 years ago, the Poles continued their daily lives, undaunted.

On Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Memorial Day, we marched the 2.5 kilometres between Auschwitz and Birkenau in solidarity of the millions murdered. At the end of the Birkenau death camp, we had a ceremony with survivors, at which the former chief rabbi of Israel and the IDF Chief of Staff spoke to us. Sitting in a cold and damp barrack, the 5 survivors who accompanied us told us their stories and experiences. One eldery woman told us that when the war finished, she would often meet with other survivors to speak about their experiences. She had always assumed that when she would die, her story would die with her. She told us that now, she has no fear of this. She knows that we will keep her story alive.

What an incredible responsibility! I am scared of this challenge. We are the first generation to live in a world without Holocaust survivors. With the ever-rising anti-semitism and alarming Holocaust denial, will we be able to stand up and set the record straight? Or will we simply let the memories of the Holocaust victims turn to dust. On our last day in Poland, we visited Treblinka, a death camp in which one millions Jews were gassed. Treblinka was completely destroyed after the war and nothing stands there besides a monument of granite slabs representing the train tracks into annhilation and tens of thousands of enormous pillars representing communtites that were wiped out. Treblinka is surrounded by a beautiful forest which the Germans grew on the ashes of murdered Jews used as fertilizer, in an attempt to cover up their horror. Standing in that awful place, I felt so alone, so empty, so forsaken. The million that were exterminated there went up in smoke and ashes. They have no tomb, no yarzheit. They had no funeral, nobody sat shiva over them or said kaddish for them. Another survivor told us how his entire village besides his family and a few other were rounded up and sent to Treblinka. He is the sole survivor of his 60 young classmates. He told us that he thinks about them every day. When he, after 120 years, passes away, will I be able to do their legacy honour? I cannot let time make their names and memories grow cold. I promise to educate people about the Holocaust, about the dangers of anti-semtism and intolerance, in the memory of the 6 million murdered Jews.

Many years after the war had finished, Simon Wiesenthal, the legendary Nazi hunter, went to visit a friend of his in New York. This friend, after the war, had moved on with his life and had become a businessman. He wanted to know why Wiesenthal did not do the same. "You're a religious man," replied Wiesenthal. "You believe in God and life after death. I also believe. When we come to the other world and meet the millions of Jews who died in the camps and they ask us, ‘What have you done?,’ there will be many answers. You will say, ‘I became a jeweler,’ Another will say, ‘I have smuggled coffee and American cigarettes,’ Another will say, ‘I built houses,’ But I will say, ‘I did not forget you’." There must certainly be great agitation in the heavens as the President of Iran claims that the Holocaust is a myth and that he will wipe Israel off the map. As anti-semitism from the Far Right and Islamofascists continues to rise in Europe and North America, we can ill afford to forget.

To the 6 million men, women and children, holy and pure martyrs, killed because they were Jews, who have vanished to the wind: I have never forgotten you.

Cross-posted from For Zion's Sake

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Some Thoughts On Michelle Obama

Michelle Obama is an attractive, stylish, very accomplished woman by any account and obviously loves her family very much so should she be beyond criticism as the Obama campaign suggests?

I mean here’s somebody who’s done everything right. She grew up in modest means. She grew up in a nuclear family. Her parents looked after her. She went to college on a scholarship. She’s worked hard for everything that she has.
She is the best mother I know. She has made repeated sacrifices on behalf of her family and has said that her children and her husband are her number one priority…
I think families are off limits. I would never consider making Cindy McCain a campaign issue, and if I saw people doing that - I would speak out against it. And the fact that I haven’t seen that from John McCain I think is a deep disappointment

I think what she says while on the trail campaigning for her husband is fair game for analysis and critique as a fair look into how the couple interacts and a glimpse into what role she would play as first lady should Barack be elected. Anything beyond that I would say absolutely not unless she takes on a major role like Hillary did and then she is fair game.
I think Laura Bush has been an exemplary first lady, classy, behind the scenes and involved in her own projects well apart from the White House and the inner workings of the administration. I see Cindy McCain doing much the same as she already has several philanthropic organizations that she heads up and works hard for. Yet somehow I doubt that Michelle will ever be out of the picture in that way since she appears to wear the pants in the Obama household and would have major input on Barack's policy initiatives. She is not one to be quiet and sit on the sidelines as her fiery speeches on behalf of her husband have shown.
That said I believe we in the GOP need to be very delicate on how we approach that critique by focusing on her words and them alone, let them speak for themselves while offering very little in analysis of what they mean, they say enough. I grew up in Condoleeza Rice's Alabama so I have an idea what it might have been like to grow up black in that environment since I am about the same age as they are and can empathize with the struggle they must have faced but America has come a very long ways since then.
To wrap it up, the Barnyard will not go after Michelle Obama, her husband gives us plenty of ammunition to go after him without tearing down his bitter half.

A Pre9/11 Mindset In Winnie The Pooh's Hundred Acres Wood

Unbelievable, Obama's national security advisor, Richard Danzig, thinks we should be looking to the pages of a Winnie the Pooh story book for foreign policy advice and Obama wants to return to the law enforcement model to fight terrorism. That worked real well didn't it since it gave us 9/11 and quite few more attacks before that and Bush's policies of taking the fight to them have brought zero more.

Richard Danzig, who served as Navy Secretary under President Clinton and is tipped to become National Security Adviser in an Obama White House, told a major foreign policy conference in Washington that the future of US strategy in the war on terrorism should follow a lesson from the pages of Winnie the Pooh, which can be shortened to: if it is causing you too much pain, try something else...

Danzig spelt out the need to change by reading a paragraph from chapter one of the children’s classic, which says: “Here is Edward Bear, coming downstairs now, bump, bump, bump on the back of his head behind Christopher Robin. It is, as far as he knows, the only way of coming down stairs. But sometimes he thinks there really is another way if only he could stop bumping a minute and think about it.”

Obama also agreed with the idiotic SCOTUS ruling that terrorist combatants captured on the battlefield overseas trying to kill our soldiers should be given the same rights as a shoplifter in US courts.
What we know is that, in previous terrorist attacks — for example, the first attack against the World Trade Center, we were able to arrest those responsible, put them on trial. They are currently in U.S. prisons, incapacitated.

And the fact that the administration has not tried to do that has created a situation where not only have we never actually put many of these folks on trial, but we have destroyed our credibility when it comes to rule of law all around the world, and given a huge boost to terrorist recruitment in countries that say, “Look, this is how the United States treats Muslims.”

So that, I think, is an example of something that was unnecessary. We could have done the exact same thing, but done it in a way that was consistent with our laws

I have read Lawrence Wright's book on the run up to 9/11 "The Looming Tower" and enough of Andrew McCarthy's, linked above, writings to know that is an insane policy sure to get more innocent people killed. McCarthy was involved in the prosecution of the first Trade Center bombers in '93 and knows a thing or two about it.
One thing is for sure is that we cannot let Barack Obama and his fluffy stuffing Winnie the Pooh foreign policy anywhere near the Oval Office this November.

Deal With the Devil


Amid rocket fire, continued attacks on Sderot schools and homes, and ever hateful rhetoric, Hamas and Israel have declared a ceasefire for the umpteenth time. Before we go and pat ourselves on the back and sing kumbaya for "giving peace a chance", we should examine the truth behind the Islamic term hudna, which is the word Hamas uses for its ceasefire.

Muhammad is considered by Muslims to be a perfect being and an exemplary role model. Jihadists often invoke his actions to support their attacks. As such, it is of crucial importance for the West to enlighten itself as to the less savoury aspects of this Islamic holy figure's life. In 628 CE, a group of 1400 Muslims pilgrims approached Mecca to perform an Islamic ritual, where they were met by a much larger force of Quraysh tribesmen. Muhammad originally intended to attack the city but he soon realized that his band of holy warrior were no match for the vastly superior Quraysh. Muhammad drew up a treaty with the Quraysh which guaranteed peace and non-belligerence for 10 years. This became known as the treaty of Hudaybiyyah. Two years later, when Muhammad commanded a band of 10 000 Muslims, as opposed to the meagre 1400 that he had 2 years prior, he dissolved his treaty with the Quraysh and conquered Mecca. From this, Islamic scholars and judges derive that it is permissible to declare a hudna with non-Muslims for a maximum of ten years when Muslims are at a disadvantage, and to violate it when Muslims are strong enough. According to the traditional Islamic view, the natural state of relations between Islam and non-Muslims is war. In fact, the world is divided into Dar al-Islam, the House of Islam, and Dar al-Harb. Muhammad declared that he had been sent "to fight until all declare that there is no god but Allah" ie. until Islam rules to world. Therefore, the reason for a ceasefire between the House of Islam and the House of War is to further to cause of jihad and Islam conquest. The medieval summar of Shafi'i jurisprudence makes the intention of the hudna clear. "If Muslims are weak, a truce may be made for ten years if necessary, for the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) made a truce with the Quraysh for that long, as is related by Abu Dawud." ('Umdat as-Salik, o9.16). It also quotes this Qur'anic verse: "So do not be fainthearted and call for peace, when it is you who are the uppermost" (47:35). Hamas does not even recognize Israel's right to exist, let alone want to lay down its arms and make peace. It has violated its past hudnas numerous times and attacked Israel when it had the chance. In January 2004, senior Hamas leader Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi offered a 10-year hudna in return for complete withdrawal from all territories captured in the Six Day War, and the establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza. Rantissi said the hudna was limited to ten years and represented a decision by the movement because it was "difficult to liberate all our land at this stage; the hudna would however not signal a recognition of the state of Israel." This is the strategy of those who claim to want a Palestinian state: that state will be used as a launch pad for the eventual destruction of all of Israel. Clearly, Hamas feels that it is not in a position of strength to continue its campaign of murder and terror. Instead of finishing the job, Israel is giving Hamas the chance to regroup and reorganize.

Hamas is not a "resistance" movement, nor does it represent the legitimate political will of the "Palestinians". It is an anti-semitic terrorist movement with the genocide of the Jewish people and the destruction of Israel at its core. The Hamas Covenant spells out its goal quite clearly: "Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it." With such an enemy, there can be no real peace. Hamas is using the excuse of a ceasefire, which it has no intention of respecting, to prepare for more deadly attacks against Israeli citizens. The Covenant quotes the hadith of the Sahi Bukari and Sahi Moslem, making its plans for the Final Solution known. "The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him." This is an organization that sponsors and carries out murderous attacks on Israeli cafes, restaurants, schools and public buildings. When an Arab gunman massacred Jewish students studying in a yeshiva, in cold blood, Hamas organized parties in the streets, gave out candies, danced and celebrated. These are not people but animals, pure and evil. With them there can be no compromise. Israel must not be in the habit of negotiating and dealing with Jew-murdering thugs. They deserve no sympathy and should not be given any legitimacy by making deals with them. According to Israeli law, it is forbidden to aid Nazis and anyone guilty of "crime against the Jewish people", defined as killing Jews, causing serious bodily or mental harm to Jews or inciting hatred against Jews, among other things, is subject to the death penalty. (Nazis and Nazi Collaborators (Punishment) Law (Amendment) 5723-1963). Hamas's goal is the eradication of the Jewish people, young and old, religious and secular, Zionist and non-Zionist. It seeks to wipe the Jewish nation off the face of the Earth and has tried to do so through suicide bombings, shootings and other terrorist attacks.

Evil cannot be tolerated or negotiated with. Evil can only be destroyed. Israel must hunt down and eliminate Hamas members and supporters. Now is the time, since Hamas is feeling weak and strained. Jew-haters can be shown no mercy or respite. The hudna is a sham and only serves to advance the cause of jihad and the ultimate destruction of Israel. Israel's leaders are fools indeed if they think that they can appease those who wish to murder us. We must follow the dictum of the rabbis: "If somebody comes to kill you, rise to kill him first."


Cross-posted from For Zion's Sake

Monday, June 16, 2008

Tiger Wins Again

This was one of the Best US Opens I have ever watched and Tiger kept his streak alive but barely. He once again needed a birdie on the final hole of the playoff to send it to sudden death and he pulled it off. Playing through pain with gritted teeth in a rollercoaster round with a very steady and inspired Rocco Mediate he managed his 14th Major title in what in his own words was the finest of all of them. I agree and I was rooting for neither man just for a great game and it was delivered in spades with the lead changing hands several times, miraculous shots and clutch putting.
I learned long ago that the game of golf is one of the greatest tests of character there is, if you want to know what is in a person, go play a round of golf with them. It will tell you more about their character than any other test I know of as a game of honor.

Obama, The Incoherent Flip Flopper

Via Hotair, you have to watch this brief presser CNN had with Obama as he flip flops enough to make John Kerry look like he was wearing tight fitting loafers. His speaking is so stilted and broken with umms and uhhs it was hard to follow as he had to admitt undeniable progress in Iraq thanks to the surge and Gen. Petraeus' tactics. This won't go over well with the nutroot moonbats he courted through the primary. He also makes the noted gaffe of calling Prime Minister Maliki the president when Jalal Talabani is the President of Iraq, the MSM would be all over McCain if he had done that. If he is so darn hyper-intelligent why does he have to think about what he says so carefully and even then screw it up? He also said he is going to go to Iraq before November when he said not long ago when McCain challenged him to that it would just be a publicity stunt. The guy is a fish out of water without his teleprompter and adoring throng of cultist sycophants.

Yet Another Obama Connection To Middle East And Chicago Corruptocrats

Blech, it appears Obama's friend and housing financier, the convicted Tony Rezko, had a roommate in college now wanted by the Iraqi government for embezzling millions while he was Minister of Electricity and has donated the max to the Obama campaign. Ayham Al-Sammarae is now being sheltered in Jordan after escaping from an Iraqi prison and wants US troops killed, sounds like a Sadrist to me. Obama sure does attract some creepy sleazeballs doesn't he? They apparently did some partying together at Rezko's with a few other noted Chicago sleazy pols.
Gateway Pundit , Talisman Gate and Bill Baar have lots more on this developing story with pictures.

Democrat Primary Demographics, Not Race But Arugala

In one of the best examinations of the demographic breakdowns of the race between Hillary and Barack that I have seen Noemie Emery looks not at race but at acedmicians versus Jacksonians in this must read piece that I would say is a quite accurate portrayal. While I am sure there is a handful of whites that won't vote for Obama based purely on his skin color there are far more that are voting for him for precisely that reason despite his far left policies. This explains a lot of Obama's support by elitist academic whites in college towns and blacks in large cities and lack of it among the more rural or working class voters. Barack does come across as an aloof academic elitist that speaks in flowery abstract terms of hope and change while running from the press or tough questioning while Hillary did manage to come across as more down to earth and more willing to engage the average voter thus her overwhelming wins in West Virginia and Kentucky late in the process.
There are currently two schools of thought on this divide as Emery points out, one is the left wing MSM's narrative of racism and I expect them to stick by it for the rest of the campaign and beyond.

School number one thinks it reflects racial hostility that Obama's opponents--first Hillary Clinton and now John McCain and the Republican party--are doing their best to rub raw. This is a case that Democrats have been making for the past 30-plus years, and its most recent airing came in a long piece in the May 19 Newsweek by Evan Thomas and Richard Wolffe. "The real test is yet to come," they warned. "The Republican Party has been successfully scaring voters since 1968, when Richard Nixon built a Silent Majority out of lower-and-middle-class folks frightened or disturbed by hippies and student radicals and blacks rioting. The 2008 race may turn on which party will win the lower and middle-class whites in industrial and border states--the Democrats' base from
the New Deal to the 1960s, but 'Reagan Democrats' in most presidential elections since then. It is a sure bet that the GOP will try to paint Obama as 'the other'--as a haughty black intellectual who has Muslim roots."
In this view--let us call it the Newsweek Doctrine--race is the issue, and the big years in history were 1964 and 1965, when Lyndon B. Johnson did the Right Thing, signing the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts, and consigning his party to electoral darkness by losing the South for the next several eons. By these lights, bigotry and fear are the main factors, and all the others are thinly masked surrogates for them. If Obama loses, this will be the excuse of the campaign and of the press that supports it.

Then there is the view that I think is more accurate which Emery advances from Michael Barone's analysis of the exit polling data.
The second school of thought admits the presence of bias as a contributing factor, but not the most important one. The real cause, it thinks, is a cultural divide among whites that splits them on matters of worldview and attitude into hostile and competing camps. Let us call this rival approach the Barone Manifesto, after its author, political analyst Michael Barone, who crunched the poll numbers for Obama's primary battles with Hillary Clinton and discovered that while the former did exceedingly well with white voters in university towns and state capitals, he did poorly almost everywhere else. From this, Barone broke the electorate down into two large divisions--academics and state employees who live in these places, whom he calls Academicians, and Jacksonians, who live elsewhere, especially in the regions close to the Appalachian mountains.

This also explains why the expected huge jump in the polls after Obama sealed up the Democrat's nomination never came and why McCain still remains within the margin of error despite this being by all accounts a Democrat election year. Meanwhile the Democrat lead Congress of Pelosi and Reid is attempting to squander whatever other advantages the Democrats had this year by doing nothing but spend, obfuscate and garner the lowest approval rating in history.

Sunday, June 15, 2008

US Open Sunday

Unreal, Tiger needed to roll in a fifteen foot birdie putt on the 18th to force a playoff with Rocco Mediate and did it so we go to 18 more tomorrow between this unlikely pairing. Rocco is a short hitting journeyman and Tiger is well,Tiger, the long hitting number 1 player in the world and one of the best to ever walk down the fairway of a major championship.
I know if my father was still here we would have played this morning and then settled in over BBQ and beer to watch with rapt attention. It was through the game of golf that we were able to repair our fractured relationship and to become father and son once again. Our love of the game would find us on the course when only devoted addicts would pick up the clubs and head to the links. I will always miss him but the lessons he tought me will always remain a part of me.
Pops, I know you are watching from on high so heres to you, Happy Father's Day!

Straight Talk About Jerusalem

Saturday, June 14, 2008

Right Wingnuts Ready To Riot If Obama Wins

That is according to moonbats at Firedog Lake one of the rabid left wing blogs, I won't link to them but you can go here , where Nice Deb links them, if you want to read the paranoid ramblings of a psychotic idiot based on no evidence what so ever.

If there is a President Obama come next Jan. 20, normal folks better brace for what the right-wing crazies have in mind. Because it’s becoming clear that they are winding themselves up now for a fresh spate of violence if Obama wins.


Last I saw it was all the lefty groups that were planning all kinds of disruptions if Obama loses including major problems at both Party Conventions later this summer. I guess all us bitter Bible thumpin racist xenophobes that are clinging to our guns out of desperation because the government isn't doing enough to take care of us,according to Obama, are going to start a civil war, dang, nobody told me yet.
In any event, a pattern is already developing, ranging from the Klan fellows who promise that Obama will be shot to the white supremacists who are actually rooting for him to win because they’re certain he will fail. We’re hearing a lot of language from the racist and “Patriot” right indicating that they expect a Democratic president to enact policies (particularly regarding gun control) that will inspire “civil war.” Which means they are looking for excuses to act out.

As always with these folks, there’s a lot of projection going on here. Because even if a President Obama follows only the most moderate of liberal agendas, the far right will look upon those policies as cause for “civil war.” That was how they responded to Bill Clinton, after all — a white male Southerner with generally conservative leanings. One can only imagine how a liberal black man from Illinois would fare.

Again the only folks in America I see currently burning things are left wing terrorist groups like the Earth Liberation Front and their cronies the Animal Liberation Front not to mention all the gangs in Democrat run cities. Heck they even burn up their own areas when their sports team wins. I am more concerned about the violence from the left should Obama lose by those that think Che, Castro and Chavez are heros of some sort. I swear those folks are seriously disturbed from the noise in their echo chamber and have no idea what conservatism is all about.
Ack, I have to stop now before I work myself into a lather and go on a hobo hunting rampage and ruin an otherwise decent cheap beer buzz.

Saturday At The US Open

Torrey Pines is one of the toughest and most beautiful challenges on the PGA circuit and it proved it again today by keeping the score near par for the best in the world. Watching Tiger Woods gut it out down the stretch on an obviously very painful knee to pull into the lead was a testament to just how good the guy is while he did get some help by the leaders stumbling he still managed two eagles and a birdie on the last six holes for a roaring finish. Tomorrow will be interesting for sure as he has never lost a major tournament when he held the 54 hole lead but will his recently operated on knee hold up? We will see.

Friday, June 13, 2008

RIP Tim Russert

He collapsed doing what he loved and will be missed as the anchor of Meet The Press. He was one of the last journalists in the MSM that worked hard, knew his stuff and delivered a fair but tough objective show. My prayers go out to his family for this sudden loss.

Interesting Rasmussen Report On Immigration

Hmm, folks are angry at the government for not doing its job and securing the border and not at the illegal immigrants themselves. I could have told you that since I don't blame them for wanting to come here from their shithole countries for a better way of life. It totally blows holes in the typical trope from the moonbats that conservatives are xenophobic bigots. Heck I like my Mexican neighbors far more than some of my white trash ones and am far more likely to go to the local taco stand, killer carnitas burritos, than the greasy spoon diner, no chain eateries in this little town.
We just want them to come here legally, learn English when they do and for the government to get its freakin' act together. Go read the report, lots of interesting figures there that largely reflect what Newt Gingrich's American Solutions also report that Americans are not anti immigrant but anti illegal immigrant and just want law enforcement to do the job that we pay them for.

Thursday, June 12, 2008

Green Socialists Block Expansion Of Oil Refineries: Updated

This is getting ridiculous as fuel prices soar, the Sierra Club and the Natural Resources Defense Council blocked the expansion of a Conoco-Philips refinery in Illinois that processes Canadian crude and are greenmailing/blackmailing a Chevron expansion of a refinery here in California.

The Sierra Club and the Natural Resources Defense Council, or NRDC, successfully pressured the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to block ConocoPhillips’ expansion of its Roxana, Ill., gasoline refinery, which processes heavy crude oil from Canada, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday.

The project would have expanded the volume of Canadian crude processed from 60,000 barrels per day to more than 500,000 barrels a day by 2015. After the Illinois EPA had approved the expansion, the green groups petitioned the federal EPA to block it, alleging ConocoPhillips wasn’t using the best available technology for reducing emissions of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides.

Apparently, the plant’s planned 95 percent reduction in sulfur dioxide emissions and 25 percent reduction in nitrogen oxides wasn’t green enough. NRDC’s opposition is quite ironic since ConocoPhillips and the activist group actually are teammates in the global warming game. Both belong to the U.S. Climate Action Partnership, a coalition of eco-activist groups and large companies that is lobbying for global warming regulation

I am embarrassed to admit that I was once a member of the Sierra Club, I thought it was more a social networking group that liked to hike and climb mountains but boy was I mistaken. They are moonbat socialists and I left as soon as I realized that.
This appears to be the second level of the greenbats efforts to prevent gas prices from being reduced through the expansion of domestic oil production, after all raw crude is of little use without refining it. So they want us to drive electric cars, fine, but what about the evironmental concerns about all those batteries and the mining of the materials that make them like nickel and cadmium or what goes into producing those batteries? Where will the power to recharge those batteries come from since they also block the expansion of nuclear power plants? I guess they really want us to get around in Flintstones style pedal cars, live in caves and eat nuts. When are Americans with a modicum of common horse sense left going to stand up to the greeno pinkos and just say no more?
Update: Newt lays it out.


Wednesday, June 11, 2008

Why Do The Democrats Like High Fuel Prices?

Well it is really fairly simple since the Democrat party has largely been taken over by socialists that believe in controlling where people live , work and how they get there. They need to force people to use the public transit systems they have spent billions of taxpayer dollars on in order to justify the expense and have long used higher fuel prices to do just that. They have long opposed the expansion into suburbs and want people all jammed into the collective of the big city socialist structure where it is easier to dictate how we live our lives even to the point of controlling what we eat.
I live in California and this has been obvious for some time and I am sure some of my readers from New York would agree with the trans fat ban and all. They don't like individualism and the power of the individual to control his own life since they know better that living as a collective where everyone is equally poor and enslaved to government bureaucracy is the way it should be. The easiest way to do this is to control access to the energy that runs our economy and gives the individual the ability to grow and possibly become rich with hard work. If you want to see what liberal socialist Democrat policies do to a state just take a look at Michigan or my state where business and brains are fleeing to less oppressive states and if those policies were enacted on a nationwide scale expect them to head to less restrictive countries. Democrats are about power and control not about the little people they "claim" to represent, that is a major reason I became a Republican.

The Alaska National Wildlife Refuge

With the price of oil and gas going through the roof drilling in ANWR is again the topic of heated debate so just what does this pristene wilderness look like? The picture above is typical of this mosquito infested bog except in winter when it is just a big white icy sheet of nothing where nothing lives. Jonah Goldberg has more pictures of the area around Prudhoe where they want to drill on just 2,000 acres of this vast wasteland of 19 million acres. Those are not fish filled lakes they are mosquito infested melt water puddles left when the winter ice melts. There are a few caribou that roam around up there but somehow I doubt they would be bothered by a few oil derricks. Don't let the environuts fool you this is not some national treasure like the Grand Canyon, the Everglades or Yellowstone so let's get that oil and natural gas out of the ground and into the system.

In further news on energy production the Democrats in Congress have blocked tapping the Green River oil shale formation and drilling on the continental shelves off our three coasts containing enough oil and natural gas to once again make the US the number one producer in the world and get us off foreign oil with enough to last till next century. Domestic oil production would keep hundreds of billions of dollars in the US economy and create many thousands of new high paying jobs. That would be a very good thing right?

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Higher CO2 Levels And Warmer Temperatures Are good For The Biosphere

Anybody that actually paid attention in biology or science classes in grade school would know that CO2 is vital to vegetation's photosynthesis process as plants use the carbon as its vital building blocks and in return releases the oxygen. A vibrant flora then contributes to a vibrant fauna with better food stocks and more drought resistant plants plus an increase in a few degrees lengthens the growing season in cooler climates while remaining relatively static around the equatorial regions. A new report shows that the biosphere has responded accordingly to increased levels of CO2 in the atmosphere with resounding growth, you would think the greeny tree huggers would rejoice at that news. I have posted many times that the new green warming movement has nothing to do with the actual environment but is simply a backdoor approach to socialism through the control of energy resources and thus control over how people live.
The Canadian press for some reason has not drank Al Gore's kool-aid and actually does some honest reporting on the subject, from the above link with a hattip to Newsbusters.

Planet Earth is on a roll! GPP is way up. NPP is way up. To the surprise of those who have been bearish on the planet, the data shows global production has been steadily climbing to record levels, ones not seen since these measurements began.

GPP is Gross Primary Production, a measure of the daily output of the global biosphere -- the amount of new plant matter on land. NPP is Net Primary Production, an annual tally of the globe's production. Biomass is booming. The planet is the greenest it's been in decades, perhaps in centuries.

Like I said you would think the environmentalists would be thrilled and promoting the production of CO2 after all during the age of the dinosaurs the CO2 levels and temperatures were much higher than today and supported massive animal and plant life. Now I am all for reducing pollution in all its forms but CO2 is not pollution, it is a vital natural gas that is imperative to the health of the biosphere and that includes us humans.
On a side note the GOP managed to block economy killing bills put forth by the Democrats to enact cap and trade laws to limit CO2 releases and today to block efforts to impose additional taxes on the oil industry. That is good news but Hugh Hewitt reports that the green nuts are preparing lawsuits to block oil and gas production in Alaska based on the polar bear's listing as threatened.
Meanwhile Newt Gingrich's petition to Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less has over 450,000 signees, if you have not signed on yet go here and add your name. He also reports from Norway on how this can be done responsibly as to environmental concerns.
As always in these posts I encourage folks to vist Icecap's site and peruse what real scientists have to say not politicians seeking to make a buck or raise taxes like Al Gore and his ilk in the Democrat party.