Filed under: Democrat Corruption, Election 2020, Environment, Free Markets, Free Speech, Freedom, Global Warming, History, Humor, Immigration, Liberalism, Media Bias, Politics, Progressives, The United States | Tags: Blame., Guilt, Your Fault!
What is it about Liberals? Why do they want us all to feel guilty? We are not supposed to be thankful on Thanksgiving, because we should feel guilty about the Native Americans. We should feel guilty if we call them Indians rather than “Native Americans”.
Some, “Antifa” or something else, have been out rioting and tearing down statues again this weekend, The statues are torn down because we should feel guilty about putting up a statue to someone currently considered unworthy. like George Washington because he once owned a few slaves. Though historically he did not like slavery and had no wish to create a plantation out of Mount Vernon. But that was 244 years ago, and statues of George Washington must be destroyed today to assuage our guilt? Makes no sense whatsoever.
George Washington, father of our country, had a few things more going for him than just the possibility that he owned a very few slaves. Many plantation owners did own slaves at the time, Society, worldwide had not yet decided that owning slaves was wrong. The young people out to riot and break windows and loot and break things seem far more interested in doing that and getting away with it because they were part of a big bunch of people all having fun doing it. Had they been promptly arrested and stuck in cells until someone bailed them out, the whole rationale for rioting might be somewhat different.
Those who choose to feel guilty about celebrating Thanksgiving because we displaced the Indians, might remember that the Native Americans did a lot of massacres as well, of the intruding Englishmen. The history of civilization is full of people being displaced by other warlike tribes, and civilizations have arisen and vanished all over the earth. Supposedly that is why we study history to understand how the world has changed in the past and will undoubtedly change more in the future. But we really don’t need to feel guilty about a past that we had nothing to do with.
If you recall, when Joe Biden decided to run for the office of the presidency, he said that he wanted a black woman as his vice president, and so chose Kamala Harris. So he wanted the credit for choosing a black woman who might become the first black and the first woman to become president rather than choosing someone for their outstanding qualifications and skills.
If you appear in public without wearing a mask, you are supposed to feel guilty. Governors have ordered people to refrain from having Thanksgiving dinners because of Covid. Wags have tacked lifesize representations of those governors to windows where people might be having a Thanksgiving dinner against governors orders. Those governors who issued orders and then had their own celebration were quickly discovered and mocked in the press, and theoretically made to feel properly guilty. Anyone departing from the conventional wisdom of the moment must be guilty, and exposed.
It was hard to choose an image, because there are so many. All the members of the House abjectly kneeling on the floor of Congress. AOC weeping as she clings to a chain-link fence staring out at what turned out to be an empty parking lot that supposedly represented imprisoned illegals at the border, Elizabeth Warren emphasizing her “Indian heritage”, once even with a Native American. All the previous presidents conferring happily with Vladimir Putin, but only Trump being accused of some kind of wrongdoing across a table from him.
Filed under: Big Tech, Capitalism, Coronavirus, Democrat Corruption, Election 2020, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Immigration, Junk Science, Progressivism, Science/Technology, Technology | Tags: Biden's Big Plans, Climate Panic, John Kerry
Reminder: There is not a “President Elect” until the Electoral College meets on December 14. But it does look like it is going to be Joe Biden, in spite of how he managed to get there. He is moving quickly to try to establish his administration, which is not encouraging. A very significant percentage of Democrat voters had never heard of the Joe and Hunter Biden scandals, and really want the matter formally investigated. That, in itself is a fairly scary note and suggests that our negativity about our news media is not far misplaced.
Joe Biden’s first big appointment is John Kerry to be the new “Climate Czar”. His qualifications rest on his being Secretary of State in the Obama Administration, and initiating the Paris Climate Accords. Uh huh. The United States provides about 14% of worldwide CO2 emissions. U.S. and European emissions have remained steady or declined significantly. Increases have come from the developing world, China, India and Africa, as they add electricity, air-conditioning and automobiles. The move to approved wind and solar energy has accounted for about 9% of our needed electricity supplies. If you stop and think for a moment about our energy needs: manufacturing, mobility, light, heat, comfort, food, only begins to touch upon our energy requirements.
I am certainly not a climate scientist, but I do have a unique outlook on the problem. I grew up on 400 acres in the mountains of Idaho at about 4,000′. We produced our own power with a small dam, a flue and our own power plant. We put up ice in the winter for summer refrigeration, warmed things with our hot springs water, fireplaces and wood stoves. We finally got Idaho power in the late 40s. Few people would have the natural assets we did. Nevertheless, I do read the science, daily.
Other than the autistic Swedish child, there’s not much evidence of a climate crisis. We have tried wind and solar energy in many forms, and found them wanting. Nuclear plants work nicely, but since Chernobyl and Fukushima, people are scared of nuclear energy. We have successful dams in our major rivers, but they don’t produce enough energy for the country as a whole. “Fracking”, simply a new way of extracting natural gas, has made us energy independent, and no longer dependent on Arab oil. Great outcry against coal-fired or natural-gas fired power plants because of the insistence that CO2, (which is a natural fertilizer for plants and is helping to feed a hungry world), is to be blamed for global warming, which is simply a natural process of warming and cooling that has gone on for centuries and centuries.
I have been following John Kerry’s career since he was a Vietnam War protester, got drafted, and had a subsequent career in government. I do not have a favorable impression of him, and would prefer that he not be in charge of anything whatsoever. He promises to fix CO2 and Covid-19 as well because they go together somehow? Both in the air? I think its an enormous amount of sheer bunk, but that seems to be what we’re stuck with. You might get in touch with your Congressmen, and study up. Good websites linked in the sidebar.
Lots of big ideas to fix society after the dreadful years of the Bad Orange Man’s successful economy, improved black lives, Middle East Peace, and successful management of the Covid Crisis. “Warp Speed” has meant that vaccine for Covid will be available in mid-December.
Here are the ten executive orders that Joe Biden says he will sign the first day he’s in office, via CNN.
Implement the already-existing Clean Air Act, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions from transportation by developing new fuel economy standards to ensure all new sales for light- and medium-duty vehicles will be electrified, and annual improvements for heavy-duty vehicles.
Double down on liquid fuels like advanced biofuels and make agriculture a key part of the solution to the climate crisis. Reduce emissions and cut consumer costs through new standards for appliance and building efficiency.
Other than that, he intends to end “gun violence”, which essentially means banning all guns. He will improve the abortion situation, so anybody can get an abortion any time for any reason. How that fits with his Catholic faith, I’m not sure. But if your interest is in easier abortions, Biden’s your guy. Going to offer citizenship to all the illegal aliens, and invite more in.
Interestingly, 44 states voted without any allegations of skullduggery. Election went off smoothly and almost all of the votes were counted in about six hours after the polls closed. No allegations of irregularities by Republican-governed states other than Georgia.
A Big-Tech expert says that Google’s “manipulations “Shifted” at least six million votes to Joe Biden. That might suggest a call to your congressman, at least a Republican one.
Joe Biden still may nominate Sen. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren to cabinet positions. The good website www.issuesinsights suggested a little “turnabout is fair play” with an article entitled “Impeach Joe Biden”. Made my day.
Filed under: Coronavirus, Democrat Corruption, Election 2020, Energy, Global Warming, Health Care, Junk Science, Law, News the Media Doesn't Want You to Hear, Politics, Progressives, Progressivism, Science/Technology, The United States
Joe Biden is coming up with new regulations, new advisors, new treatments. He may insist that everyone wear masks, but the role of masks is much misunderstood. A mask protects other people from your exhalations, spittle, coughs or sneezes. It does not protect you from other people. The mask is meant keep your spittle in. Your protection from other people’s coughs or spittle is dependent on your washing your hands obsessively and frequently, social-distancing, and not touching your face. Almost counter-intuitive. Stay home. You may soon be ordered to do so. Governors are all over the map with their orders and directions, and may or may not know what they are talking about. Apparently Thanksgiving dinner is out. Governors may order you to forget it.
I am remaining confined at home, ordering groceries delivered. Difficult. The folks that pack the groceries don’t know that bananas must be a little greenish at the ends, and no brown spots. They don’t know that you sniff at the stem end of a cantaloupe to see if it smells like cantaloupe. If it doesn’t it’s no good. Those are the little complications of shopping at the grocery store. Who knew that the bagels you ordered might turn out to be whole wheat bagels? Whoever heard of whole wheat bagels? Don’t open the door to anyone.
Joe Biden’s Coronavirus Adviser urges a lockdown for “4 to 6 weeks.” He suggests that “we could pay for a package right now to cover all of the wages, lost wages for individual workers, for losses to small companies, to medium-sized companies or city, state, county governments. We could do all of that. (The doctor is a little light on his understanding of economics) He wrote that the problem with the March to May lockdown was that it was not uniformly stringent across the country.
Biden’s four leading priorities: Covid-19, economic recovery, racial equity and climate change. No delusions that a Biden administration will be good for liberty or limited government.
Breitbart headline” “Biden to Make Combatting Climate Change an “All-of-Government Agenda.” Well, there we go. There is nothing anyone can do to “combat climate change.” The climate has been changing for millions of years. The climate today is very much like it was 1,000 years ago. Carbon dioxide is a natural fertilizer for plants, and crops around the world are bountiful. Hungry people are being fed. Joe Biden will formulate a governing strategy to curb carbon emissions by maximizing executive authority. He will rejoin the Paris Climate Accord on his first day at the White House and create a new division within the Department of Justice to combat pollution.There’s a proposal to spen $2 trillion over four years to combat climate change.
One million jew jobs in the auto industry to boost the production of energy-efficient vehicles. Legislation to incentivize individuals to trade in their gas=powered vehicles for ones running on either electricity or hydrogen. He apparently wants to adopt a 100 percent clean-electricity standard by 2035.
This might have a rather large impact on the coal and natural gas industries that produce about 63 percent of all electricity in the country. You cannot trust your government. You have to be informed, and know what these nutcases are up to.
Filed under: Big Tech, Capitalism, Capitalism, Coronavirus, Democrat Corruption, Domestic Policy, Election 2020, Global Warming, Junk Science, Law, Media Bias, Politics, Progressives, Progressivism, Socialism, The Constitution
He said he had a “mandate” He just seemed a little unsure about what the mandate was about. It seems to be about the climate, but polls show that people aren’t particularly worried about the climate. The Earth has warmed slightly, and there is a little increased CO2, which is plant food. Carbon dioxide is a natural fertilizer for plants, and crops around the world are growing a little more bountiful, and there are far fewer hungry people.
Joe Biden wants to ban “fracking” which is simply an easier, cleaner way of extracting natural gas. He waffles a lot, I guess because he doesn’t know what fracking is, only that it is clearly bad. Raising the price of gasoline drastically would be crippling for the economy- a jump from around $2 to over $4 would make people sit up and notice.
Since somewhere around 1988 politicians and activists have tried to sell the American people on the idea that fossil fuels are bad, and that we have access to remedies. We don’t. Wind and solar don’t work. We have pretty conclusively proved that. They simply do not and cannot produce enough energy to run a modern society. What gets transitioned is your standard of living.
You can replace coal, for example, with natural gas, but you haven’t accomplished anything. The wind does not blow all the time, and may not blow for days, and some days it may blow too hard for the turbines. The sun does not shine every day. There are clouds. Some days it rains. Nuclear power works, but since Chernobyl and Fukushima in Japan, there’s not much interest in nuclear energy. Wind turbines and solar arrays cannot be manufactured or installed without massive quantities of fossil fuels. Nothing happens in our modern world without fossil fuels, from our manufacturers to a trip to the grocery store where most of the products are produced with the use of fossil fuels, to the fleets of trucks that transport goods around the country.
Democrats claim there is no election fraud, but seven Milwaukee Wards report more presidential votes than registered voters. State voter turnout is nearly 90 percent, which is virtually impossible. The Climate Crisis and the Covid Crisis are melding. The WHO Director-General said the pandemic has given new impetus to the need to accelerate efforts to respond to climate change, which they said in 2018 was the greatest health challenge of the 21st century. Walmart CEO Doug McMillon says it’s time to “Reinvent Capitalism Post-Coronavirus. But never fear, Reddit Co-Founder Alexis Ohanian has spoken with Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, about building a better Tech Industry.
Enter Solyndra in the blank space over Bob Hope’s head in the sidebar. That was a massive and costly solar experiment. And as for wind farms, it costs over $35,000 to dismantle a single worn-out turbine, if I remember correctly.
My favorite voter remains the elderly gentleman who voted, who was born in 1823. There are other surprising voters, but that one takes the cake.
Filed under: Capitalism, Capitalism, Democrat Corruption, Economics, Election 2020, Environment, Global Warming, History, Junk Science, Media Bias, Progressivism, The United States | Tags: Christiana Figueres, Climate Change, Elizabeth Warren
RECENT EARTH CLIMATE HISTORY
600 – 200 B.C.: An Unnamed Cold Period
200 BC to about AD 600: The Roman Warming
600 to 900: The Dark Ages Cold Period
900 to 1300: Medieval Warming
1300 to 1850: The Little Ice Age (two stages)
MODERN CLIMATE HISTORY
1850 – 1940: Especially between 1920-1940: Warming
1940 to 1975: Cooling Trend
1976-1978: Sudden Warming Spurt
1979 to 1998: +1º
1998 to 2011: +1º
The Medieval Warming period led to the Renaissance which began approximately in 1300 and ended approximately in 1700. A bountiful time, wine grapes grew in England, food was plentiful and there was a flowering of learning and art. Think Michelangelo, Raphael, and Copernicus among others. What I’m getting at here, is the idea that if we are facing climate doom, the world is going to die in 10 or 12 years if we don’t save it by stopping “fracking,” stop using oil and gasoline, and eliminating plastic bags. That’s what you get for listening to “celebrities” instead of studying up on the science.
I was an English Major, which means that I learned how to read hard stuff, and read a lot. That does not mean that I’m always right, much as I like to think so. Christiana Figueres, the General Secretary of the IPCC, was quite sure that the object of “climate change” was as a tool to get rid of Capitalism. Leftists do not like capitalism, which seems a bit strange, but economics is not their strong point. Capitalists to them are business CEOs and owners, and the “Rich”. The Left is entitled to be in charge because they are morally superior, it would be helpful if we all understood that.
Conservatives have long sneered at the Left because they were the Southern slave owners in the Civil War, but the Left has ended that accusation by electing the first black president, who served for two terms, which puts them back in the morally superior category. Global Warming, plastic bags, ending fracking, and giving taxpayer money to illegal aliens adds to their sense of superiority.
America is a nation of immigrants, as you know, which leads them to believe that immigrants are special, and just because they can’t be bothered to enter the country the legal way, shouldn’t keep them from sharing in the bounty of America. So Leftists care about illegal immigrants, which means hating I.C.E. (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) and making sure that illegal immigrants get stimulus money. It is that mindset that makes them believe that if little immigrant children were kept in cages, it was obviously done by conservatives, contrary to the actual actions of the Obama administration. Once you get the “entitled to be in charge because they are morally superior” theme firmly in mind, it makes understanding all the other stuff simple. Or at least it helps.
Elizabeth Warren ranted that President Trump was trying to kill everybody in the world because he would not correctly address climate change, or something like that. The very slight warming we have had has brought enormous blessings to the world. The slight increase in the amount of CO² in the atmosphere has been a bounty for mankind for it is a natural fertilizer for plants. More bountiful crops mean the hungry are well fed and there is less starvation in the world. Forests grow more as well, and there is more wood for fuel and for building homes.
In case there is any confusion, Elizabeth Warren is calling her climate program “The Blue New Deal”. Don’t want any confusion with the Green thing.
Do make time to visit Climate Depot and Dr. Roy Spencer and the others listed in the sidebar. There’s an enormous amount of hype out there, and the best defense are informed citizens. Solar energy and wind energy are nice, when they aren’t killing birds, but they cannot provide the energy needed by a modern society. Just doesn’t work.
Filed under: Capitalism, Capitalism, Democrat Corruption, Economy, Election 2020, Health Care, History, Media Bias, Politics, Science/Technology, The United States | Tags: COVID-19, Fact Checking, Internet Changes.
The internet is changing. Of course it is always changing, but the way in which it is changing is something new. The initial idea was that it would be an opportunity for what were formerly magazines available in bookstores or by subscription to have a second outlet, and far more would be available for free. It was assumed that the ability to reach so many people online would create advertising that could reach so many people that it would pay for everything.
Different people use the internet differently. I’m a reader, and am usually looking for information rather than entertainment. Others want to share their lives with their friends and the internet replaces a lot of phone calls and letters with the ability to include pictures and have lots of sharing. Some use it entirely for work, and get their entertainment from television or online movies. I’m looking for world and national news, politics, general information. I do not want to hear from Hollywood “celebrities” at all. If they make a good movie, I might go to a theater, but their abilities lean toward acting, not useful thought. “Celebrities” have name recognition and are “click-bait” for websites. So would-be celebrities no longer have to pay press agents, they only need to say something outrageous, and their utterances make “news.” I don’t want an internet that is all about people insulting each other.
Google has taken over control of advertising, and where ads can be placed on the page and where they can appear. Along with many others, I’m annoyed by ads that block or limit the piece I am trying to read. There are others who don’t like ads, so an industry has sprung up to make ads less frequent or even to make them disappear (for a fee). So, surprisingly there are ads for services that remove all ads, which has resulted in websites demanding that you block your ad removal service or they won’t let you read the piece you are reading. Google lets you block ads but wants to know why you are blocking them, I presume to try to discover your reasoning and figure out how to get around it.
Ads are not producing the revenue needed to pay for the staff of writers that the various websites have employed. You have undoubtedly noticed that the websites are asking you to subscribe to get the important pieces, which they will label to show that you can only read them if you have subscribed. The question now is if you will subscribe so you can read everything, and if the number of people who will subscribe is enough to pay the salaries and benefits of all the writers the website wants to employ, and helps to maintain the cost of having a website. Everybody’s expectations were perhaps a little higher then was justified.
How many websites do you visit each day, how many of those want you to subscribe? I visit about 20 websites each day. I could whittle that down a bit, but if you multiply the monthly cost of all for 12 months, and add it all together, it’s a fairly significant sum. Not going to happen. How will the internet develop to cope with all this? I spent a lot of years working in advertising, and some significant shifts from Google would improve things.
Tried tonight to watch a bit of the vice-presidential candidates’ debate. Different moderator, different tactics, but impossible to limit candidates to the assigned time. Kamala Harris has come equipped with many attack modes, most of them simply political attacks that are completely untrue. Many might believe your attack that President Trump did not respond correctly to the Covid -19 virus, but it’s just false.
The virus was unknown when it hit the nursing home in the next suburb to the north of my house, but as soon as it became known that a visitor who was returning from Wuhan, China had infected many of the residents, President Trump slammed a halt to all traffic from China. In January, which provoked screaming outrage from Democrats who accused him of racism and xenophobia. He promptly began a deliberate and thorough response to the needs of each state. We had to learn about the virus before we could do the right thing.
To try to blame President Trump for all the corona-virus deaths to date (and in the future) is absurd. Kamala Harris is attempting to use in the debate tonight all the party-line accusations the Democrats have come up with so far, most of them unfair or untrue. Many actions taken with care turned out to be unneeded (like the tent hospitals the military set up) that were not used at all. Ms. Harris is not projecting vast competency.
Joe Biden has spent 36 years in Congress as a likeable senator, without significant accomplishment, and 8 years as Barack Obama’s vice president. He is 77 years old, and appears to be afflicted by “senior moments” or some oncoming dementia which many find troubling for a future president. Many worry that Kamala Harris could become president for she doesn’t seem qualified. Biden’s family seems to have been significantly enriched by vice-presidential influence. In a political season, the charges will be many, and not all of them are true, as I’m sure you have noticed, and internet fact-checks aren’t significantly accurate.
Donald Trump has been attacked with the most vicious slanders that the Democrats can find. I can’t remember a campaign ever that has been so angry and so unfair. Trump is not one to suffer silently, and Twitter has been his major outlet. He slams right back. Many find his “tweets” “unpresidential”, which depends on your ideas of the proper words of a president. I’ve lived through a significant number of Presidents, but this campaign really is different. We are faced with a pandemic from Wuhan, China that has killed thousands across the world. We have had to learn about it slowly, step by step. Most of the rest of the world has suffered too. Stop and think about the toilet paper crisis.
The U.S. has had 7,640,890 confirmed cases. 214,947 deaths, and 4,958,850 Americans have recovered. Joe Biden tried to claim there were 200 million deaths, so you see how easy it is to get tangled up in the numbers. Two hundred thousand is still too many. Globally there have been 36,063,675 confirmed cases and 1,054.153 deaths while around 25 million have recovered.
Democrats are urging people to avoid the vaccines that may be available before the end of the year, because” Trump is involved”. That’s going too far. People are apt to fear vaccines, but when you understand the testing involved, our official guidelines are pretty trustworthy. There are protocols in the United States for vaccines to make sure that none are released before they have been thoroughly tested and are remarkably safe.
When you know your history, of pandemics and new medicines and new treatments, the United States ranks remarkably highly for such a big country. We have a really fine medical sector, and they do a pretty good job. Lots of diseases still out there, but they are working hard to conquer them. News today about planets that seem to be habitable, and perhaps even more habitable than this one. And now we have a Space Force, and what is next, and where will we go?
Filed under: Bureaucracy, Capitalism, Domestic Policy, Economy, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, History, Junk Science, Law, Media Bias, Politics, Progressives, Progressivism, Science/Technology, The United States
We have had some nice rain over the last two days, and the skies have cleared, the air has cleared, and we’re pretty much back to normal. California is not. The government is not sure at all just who they should listen to, and the result has been a catastrophe.
Environmentalists want everyone to believe that we can forego nasty petroleum fuels, and rely on clean, beautiful wind and solar energy which is free, well, except for the huge cost of wind turbines, their upkeep, the rare minerals required to construct them and the underlying simple fact that the wind does not blow all the time, nor does the sun shine on solar arrays all the time. There are cloudy days and rainy days when neither wind nor sun are noticeable. Wind and sun may be visible, but they are not necessarily available when needed. We are so accustomed to having energy at the flick of a switch that we don’t really give it any thought at all.
At the dawn of the nuclear age, we thought we could power anything with nuclear energy, but then there was the Chernobyl disaster in Ukraine, still an abandoned city, I believe. And then the Fukushima accident in Japan in 2011 in Okuma, Fukushima Prefecture, which was started by the Tòhoku earthquake and tsunami. A couple of disasters like that and interest in nuclear plants begins to fade. In the United States we have some great river systems and dams that produce lots of reliable energy, but the environmentalists squawk about the fish runs and damage the dams do. Probably everything that has an upside also has a downside. Some want to remove all dams, just because.
We are uncertain about costs and benefits, usefulness and dangers, needs, in other words we don’t know very much about the problems at all, and are apt to fall for anything that sounds good, particularly if it is fairly remote. When it’s your house that burned down, you pay a little closer attention.
Dr. Roy Spencer PhD, who runs the satellites that measure the earths’ temperature for NASA, has several basis articles at his website on, for example, “Global Warming 101”, “Global Warming Background”, “Global Warming Natural or Manmade?” which you will find useful. There are others in the sidebar, and each of those will direct you to other scientific sites.
California Governor Gavin Newsom is getting a well-deserved batch of criticism for his handling of the wildfires. The Native Americans learned to minimize the damage by controlled small fires and cutting away dead trees and brush, but we moderns have had more trouble getting our minds around the problem. Did you know it costs something over $43,000 to dismantle a single wind turbine?
Filed under: Bureaucracy, Domestic Policy, Environment, History, Junk Science, Media Bias, Politics | Tags: Dead Brush and Trees Removed, It is NOT Climate Change, Thinned Forests
We had a little rain last night. Not exactly the needed downpour, but still significant rain, and the hill across the way is now more visible. Today there is supposed to be light rain, and it’s not till next Thursday that the online forecast suggests real rain. We’ll see. The online forecast seems to be an iffy business. On the way to an appointment yesterday, downtown Bellevue was wreathed in light gray smoke. Just enough so to be noticeable. It is raining now.
“Climate Change” is quite emphatically not the cause of wildfires in the Pacific Coast States — California, Oregon and Washington, no matter how plaintively the governors of those respective states claim that it is beyond their control. The fires are man-made and have resulted in unnecessary deaths. The cause is mismanagement of western forestlands by the elected officials who are charged with managing them efficiently for the benefit of the public who has given them those offices.
There are “environmentalists” who dream of natural green forests and don’t like the idea of human interference. I usually assume that they all live in downtown apartments, and have little contact with actual nature. I grew up on 400 acres of actual nature with a river flowing through it, bordering on National Forest and Bureau of Land Management land. There are unfriendly animals, bear, coyotes, lynx and cougar, rattlesnakes, skunks, and porcupines. Never ran into a cougar, but I’ve heard them scream. ”
“Environmentalists” have warped ideas of the out-of-doors which they encounter only on long weekends and vacations. Their ideas of pristine nature don’t mix with solar cells and windmills. Sounds good, but they just do not produce enough energy to maintain a modern society. Nuclear energy works well, but since Chernobyl in 1986 and the Fukushima disaster in 2011, people are scared of nuclear energy, though neither accident was inevitable. We learn from our mistakes and the mistakes of others, not always, but often.
We are not interfering with nature if we clear out the deadwood and trim trees and dead brush across forestlands and wilderness. We do it in our own yards so it doesn’t become an eyesore. California Governor Gavin Newsom and Washington Governor Jay Inslee are major climate fanatics, assuming that “climate change” is to blame for anything unpleasant. There’s been widespread objection to “clear cutting” and logging in general. Joe Biden is already suggesting that he would adopt the “Green New Deal” which is more useless windmills and his back and forth about banning “fracking” which he was all for until he found out that there are a lot of “fracking” jobs in Pennsylvania.
West Coast wildfire will not end with a fight on climate change. Clear cutting and controlled burning to thin overgrown forest and removing deadwood works nicely. Native Americans have been managing their forests for years with just such efforts. Joe Biden has accused President Trump of being a “climate arsonist” for not “heeding the science” in claiming that climate change is the cause of the wildfires. The headline at Politico is “Biden labels Trump a climate arsonist, accusing him of net heeding science.” Uh huh.
Filed under: Bureaucracy, Democrat Corruption, Domestic Policy, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Junk Science, Politics, Progressivism, Regulation, Science/Technology, The United States | Tags: Gavin Newsom, Global Warming, Jay Inslee
Washington State is still smoky, some local fires, mostly I believe, smoke drifted north from California. Visibility is not normal, ( Rain forecast for Friday) but we’re told in Eastern Washington, across the mountains, visibility is about the length of a football field, at least considerably worse than here.
Our incompetent Democrat governor, Jay Inslee, follows in the steps of California’s incompetent governor Gavin Newsom, to proclaim the wildfires are because of global warming, and we just have to give up our cars, or at least switch to electric cars, and be kinder to Mother Earth so she doesn’t punish us for our fossil fuels. Which is all nonsense.
Sorry. Carbon Dioxide is not the control switch for the climate of the earth. The Sun is.
We had Ice Ages and Heat Waves long before we had gasoline powered cars, or even discovered fossil fuels. Native Americans did controlled burning, thinned out brush, and even cut down trees to keep their lands safe from fire. California is on fire because the governor has not funded the necessary cleanup, as is Washington State.
Lots more expensive when you have to pay lots of firefighters coming for high pay to fight the fires in our forests in our forests, but you can’t be blamed if it is the result of a global pandemic. Our respective governors, having never bothered to study up even slightly, accept as gospel the party line. Trump bad, Paris Climate Accord essential to save the Earth. Trouble is the scientists started making “models”to help them decide what to do, but they were too arrogant to grasp that they didn’t know enough to make viable models, because there is so much we don’t yet understand about the Sun and the Earth and the galaxy and the interactions between them.
The debate is over around climate change. Just come to the state of California, observe it with your own eyes a grinning Newsom told reporters while touring the fire-ravaged North Complex near Oroville. It’s not an intellectual debate, it’s not even debatable. The debate is over around climate change. Just come to the state of California, observe it with your own eyes,a grinning Newsom told reporters while touring the fire-ravaged North Complex near Oroville. It’s not an intellectual debate, it’s not even debatable.
Breitbart reported this morning:
The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said Thursday that the August Complex Fire has burned 471,185 acres in the Elk Creek and Stonyford area, surpassing the 2018 Mendocino Complex Fire, which burned 459,123 acres.
Six of the largest fires in California’s history have taken place in 2020. Cal Fire said 29 major wildfires are active and more than 3.1 million acres have burned in the state since the beginning of the season.
The National Interagency Fire Center said 102 large fires have burned a combined 4.4 million acres in 12 states in the western United States, resulting in some two dozen deaths in California, Oregon, and Washington.
In California, five people were killed in the LNU Lightning Complex, 10 were killed in the North Complex, and one each was killed in the CZU August Lightning Complex, August Lightning Complex, Tatham Fire, and Hills Fires.
So there you go, 19 people killed so far, but just blame it all on global warming. I grew up on 400 acres bordered by National Forest at about 4,000′. Many of our closest friends were Forest Service people, and others were loggers or ran lumber mills.
Bernie Sanders is using the current wildfires to push for a Green New Deal, of course blaming Trump who he says “rejects science and calls climate change a hoax.” Christiana Figueres, who was the General Secretary of the IPCC said at a news conference that the idea of Climate Change was the best weapon they had for destroying Capitalism.
You can natter on all you want about Global Warming, but if you had thinned the forests, rid them of dry brush, we would not have the forest fires of three states poisoning our air and blanketing us with smoke.
Filed under: China, Coronavirus, Democrat Corruption, Domestic Policy, Health Care, Heartwarming, History, National Security, News the Media Doesn't Want You to Hear, Politics, Progressives, Science/Technology, The United States | Tags: Blame, Stick it to Trump, The Corona Virus
Democrats keep trying to rid us of President Donald Trump, they tried impeachment, several times. They loathe Trump, but they just can’t figure out how to get rid of him and his systematic repeal of Obama’s progressive project. The problem is that the Democrats just want to be in control. Just what it is that they expect to accomplish when they manage to get control isn’t really clear, and there’s the rub.
The current best idea seems to be blaming him for the Corona Virus. If they can just manage to establish that he didn’t respond quickly enough, professionally enough, carefully enough or something like that, then they can blame him for all of the Covid-19 deaths. That would take care of him!
The first COVID-19 deaths in the United States happened a few miles north of my house when a visitor to a nursing home who had just returned from Wuhan, China infected the residents. President Trump quickly banned any and all flights from China. He referred to it as the China virus or the Wuhan virus. (Outcry. Racial prejudice, etc.) Got automobile companies making ventilators, everybody making masks, hospital ships in New York harbor and in California, Cruise ships anchored, military setting up emergency hospitals in tents in public parks and in parking garages. Experts called in to advise.
Of course they don’t mention that, they talk about results. Here are the five COVID-19 Charts Democrats are anxious to hide. Click on the link. Copy and save the link. Share it with family and friends!
This is from http://www.issues&insights.com, a fairly new website founded by the writers from Investors Business Daily, and is excellent. It has become one of my favorites. They even feature Michael Ramirez’s wonderful political cartoons.
Filed under: Bureaucracy, Capitalism, Coronavirus, Democrat Corruption, Domestic Policy, Education, Energy, Environment, History, Junk Science, Law, Media Bias, Police, Politics, Taxes, The United States, Unemployment | Tags: Is Anyone Watching?, Political Ads, The Online Convention
Filed under: Bureaucracy, Capitalism, Coronavirus, Domestic Policy, Economics, Economy, Education, Politics, Regulation, Science/Technology, Technology, The United States | Tags: Catching COVID-19, Online Education, Reopening Schools
Our society is not quite comfortable yet with the computer world. Comfortable is the wrong word, but I don’t know what the right one is. We currently are only beginning to learn what are their real possibilities and what are their dangers. And of course the problem is not the computers, but the people operating them.
A computer is just a machine grown out of the merger of adding machines, code-breaking machines a few trips in space, television and a lot of very complicated efforts to build something new to measure and compute. (There’s a completely scientific definition for you.) But the point I’m attempting to make is that the problems or faults are people problems and faults, not machine problems, at least for the most part.
We have had a lot of very complicated efforts to create models to tell us what to expect in, for example, climate and Covid-19. Doesn’t work. The models have been wildly wrong, and cannot be depended on at all. We just don’t know enough about what we are trying to enter. And the answers we get from the models are gradually proving to be completely wrong. Lots of bureaucratic phases about lockdowns and re-opening, and particularly the opening (or not) of the schools.
So far, online education in the school system is a major flop. Teachers are afraid to go back in the schools for fear of getting the Covid virus. Kids out of school are ranging from refusing to do the online classes, to simply finding them boring and ineffective. Teachers are not expert in creating online classes. Parents have to work, and leaving the kids home is bad. Some parents are banding together and hiring tutors. All very, very complicated. President Trump is absolutely correct. The kids need to be in school.
Does everybody understand that you wear a mask to keep your exhalations from infecting anyone else — not to protect you from whatever you might breathe in?
Here’s an article from AIER, the American Institute for Economic Research, on the models and reopening. Worth your time. The photo is borrowed from that article, there were no photo credits, but it’s a fun picture.
American Elephants 