Saturday, January 17, 2009

AP continues to market global warming, Billy Mays-style


The Associated Press continued its marketing campaign for carbon trading this morning. Amidst a record-setting cold snap, a distinct non-rise in sea levels, and incessant growth in the polar ice caps, the AP relayed news that 2008 was among the ten warmest years ever.

Last year was the eighth warmest year on record, according to the National Climatic Data Center. The world's temperature in 2008 tied that of 2001 according to the center, a division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Preliminary calculations show the world's average temperature for 2008 was 0.88 degree Fahrenheit above the 20th Century average of 57.0 degrees F.

The ranking means that all of the 10 warmest years on record have occurred since 1997.

Odd. Time Magazine reported that 2008 was one of the coldest years on record.

The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) on Tuesday released its weather analysis for the year and found that 2008 has been the coolest year since the turn of the century. Using data gathered from Britain's Hadley Centre, the University of East Anglia and the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA), the WMO reported that the average global temperature in 2008 was 57.74 degrees F (14.3 degrees C), cooler than the past several years.

And initial reports that 2007 was the warmest year on record turned out to be completely false.

An error in RSS data has been identified by John Christy and Roy Spencer, competitors from UAH...... 2007 remains the coldest year of the century according to HadCRUT3 weather stations...

One month ago, we noticed that November 2007 was the coldest month since January 2000. Well, the RSS MSU satellite data prepared by remss.com show that December was even cooler.

And in the U.S., January 2009 is likely to prove among the coldest months in recorded history.

So who would benefit from false data-sets and incessant Billy Mays-style marketing of global warming? That would be Al Gore, the UN's IPCC and Barack Obama's "global warming czar", all of whom have businesses that will allow them to personally profit from carbon trading.

When the World Rainforest Movement and other hard-core environmentalists call cap-and-trade "fraudulent" and "a scam", I think it's safe to say that carbon offsets are a loopy delusion suitable only for a bad science fiction movie.

Related: "Mark your time, hu-mans" and "Al Gore, Laughingstock."

Larwyn's Link Kerplosion: Stimulapalooza


The Global Intifada: Gaza becomes a World War: Zomblog
Fresh clues: Iran's nuclear intrigue: WSJ
Today's Bias: Don Surber

Califailure: Don Surber
Perino mocks Obama: Jammie Wearing Fool
Slumdog Millionaire: Jules Crittenden

'Iranian Unit' of Hamas Destroyed: Fausta
Human sacrifice: National Review (Mona Charen)
Did Ann Coulter go too far?: Ace o' Spades

Terrorists killed my Dad: LA Times (Joseph F. Connor)
Governor issues statement on ANWR legislation: Gov. Palin
IMF told Geithner about taxes: WSJ

Veteran Airman pulls off a rare feat: WSJ
The Dead Baby Strategy: Washington Times
Global Warming Skepticism Panic Attack at Huffington Post: NewsBusters

Here comes gun control!: STACLU
Save Gaza: Bloomberg
Are police taking sides in protests?: Pajamas Media (Mary Madigan)

SLAPP!: Debbie Schlussel
"You can't fire me, I'm drunk!": Reuters
Wave of Hate: The JC

Tax cuts not central planning Politburo: CNet (Declan McCullagh)

The bailout's cost so far has ballooned to $8.5 trillion, not counting the $5.2 trillion in Fannie and Freddie guarantees, although the Treasury should eventually recover some or even much of this amount. If deficit spending were a sure way to stimulate the economy, the Treasury could simply borrow, say, $100 trillion -- and the economic malaise of the last few months would evaporate.

A recent article by Greg Mankiw, a professor of economics at Harvard and former adviser to President Bush, surveys recent research and concludes that each dollar of government spending increases economic activity by only 1.4 dollars, while (according to Obama's top economics adviser) a dollar of tax cuts raises the GDP by about $3. And Tyler Cowen of George Mason University suggests that "we are being asked to spend (untold) hundreds of billion dollars" even though the evidence it will have a positive impact "is inconclusive."

It's about growing government power, not growing the economy, peons.

Friday, January 16, 2009

Treasury nominee Geithner held to a lower standard than even an entry-level IRS employee


Barack Obama's nominee for Treasury Secretary, Timothy Geithner, failed to pay more than $34,000 in taxes during his tenure at the International Monetary Fund (IMF). If he is confirmed as Treasury Secretary, Geithner would oversee the Internal Revenue Service.

Problem is that the nominee failed to pay his taxes despite being advised in writing by the IMF of his liability.

The 1998 IRS Restructuring and Reform Act lists "10 types of actions for which IRS employees of the agency can be fired."

It would seem Timothy Geithner is held to a lower standard than even an entry-level IRS employee.

10 Deadly Sins Government Executive December 1, 1999


The 1998 IRS Restructuring and Reform Act lists 10 types of actions for which employees of the agency can be fired:

1. Willful failure to obtain the required approval signatures on documents authorizing the seizure of a taxpayer's home, personal belongings or business assets.

2. Providing a false statement under oath with respect to a material matter involving a taxpayer or taxpayer representative.

3. With respect to a taxpayer, taxpayer representative or other employee of the IRS, the violation of any right under the Constitution or federal laws such as the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1990 Americans W ith Disabilities Act.

4. Falsifying or destroying documents to conceal mistakes made by any employee with respect to a matter involving a taxpayer or taxpayer representative.

5. Assault or battery on a taxpayer, taxpayer representative or other employee of the IRS - but only if there is a criminal conviction, or a final judgment by a court in a civil case, with respect to the assault or battery.

6. Violations of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, Treasury Department regulations or IRS policies for the purpose of retaliating against, or harassing, a taxpayer, taxpayer representative, or other employee of the IRS.

7. Willful misuse of the provisions of Section 6103 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 for the purpose of concealing information from a congressional inquiry.

8. Willful failure to file any return of tax required under the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 on or before the date prescribed to do so.

9. Willful understatement of federal tax liability.

10. Threatening to audit a taxpayer for the purpose of extracting personal gain or benefit.

Gee, do you think there's a double standard, Senator Chris "HUD Statement" Dodd? How about you, Barney "Freddie's Fannie" Frank? Got an opinion, Sandy "Pants" Berger?

I get the sense that our beloved government officials are more royalty than representatives. That whirring sound you hear are the Framers spinning in their graves.

Linked by: Gateway Pundit. Thanks!


Hat tip: Kasper.

Larwyn's Link Kerplosion: When newspapers are gone...


When newspapers are gone, what will you miss?: Seth Godin
UN Agency in Gaza hired Hamas members: Fox News
What is that small Israeli weapon the IDF is using?: Eye on the World

The Minnesota Recount Was Unconstitutional: WSJ
Evolution of Chicago Man: Quincy Pundit
Merrill pwns Bank of America: Reuters

Michael Moore lawsuit update": Michael Yon
The genetically coded ignorance of Bill Moyers: The Augean Stables
The Bill Moyers vs. David Duke Quiz: American Thinker (Edward Olshaker)

Bush destroyed a dictator. Clinton installed one.: WSJ
Three brilliant articles by three brilliant women: Vocal Minority
Separated at birth?: South Side of the 5

Defending Ann Coulter: Scoffery:

As with all of her books, Ann Coulter has irked the press. There seems to be no amount of logic and truth that will sway the media into taking an honest look at what Ann writes. Instead, we get sections of her books taken out of context and with the intent and meaning changed.

As she goes from program to program, it is now clear that none of the interviewers are actually reading her words, let alone listening to what she is saying. Take the single mother brouhaha that has now erupted. Ann is quite clear that she is not attacking single mothers, but instead informing the great uniformed that children raised by single mothers tend to cause a majority of crime and tend to live in poverty. She is blasting a culture that makes single motherhood look like a noble thing, instead of showing us the ramifications of these choices.

As with the “ladies” on the view, Coulter is never allowed to speak without being shouted down by the interviewers...

Thursday, January 15, 2009

Chart: Michelle Obama's Salary


Below you'll find a helpful chart and timeline explaining Michelle Obama's ultra-critical position at the University of Chicago Hospital (UCH), a position coincidentally created just after her husband's election to the Senate... and dissolved just minutes after she resigned to move into the White House.

Sandwiched, of course, by Sen. Obama's $1M earmark to UCH.

In 2002, Michelle Obama was hired by the University of Chicago Hospital as its "Executive Director for Community Affairs" at a salary of approximately $120,000.

In January of 2005, Barack Obama was sworn in as a United States Senator.

In March of 2005, Michelle Obama was promoted to "Vice President for Community and External Affairs" and her salary bumped nearly $200,000 (from $121,910 to $316,962). This position was "newly created" for Mrs. Obama.

In February of 2006, Barack Obama requested a $1 million earmark for a new hospital pavilion at the University of Chicago.

Effective 9 January 2009, Michelle Obama resigned her position at UCH.

Effective 14 January 2009, Michelle Obama's VP position was eliminated, its functions absorbed into another executive's position. This prompted writer Don Rose to ask "[If] that work can be folded into another guy’s, why was it separate in the first place?"

Excellent question. Some roguish wags might speculate that a quid pro quo arrangement was in effect; pay-to-play as it were. But that seems highly unlikely given Barack Obama's high ethical standards *.

* Ignoring, of course, Auchi, Ayers, Blagojevich, Jarrett, Jones, Rezko, etc.

Linked by: Gateway Pundit, Michelle Obama Watch and Porcupine Rim. Thanks!

Laughingstock Al Gore dumbfounded as he tries to explain record-breaking cold around the U.S.


Can you detect the pattern?

• Flint Michigan set a record low Wednesday hitting 19 degrees below zero.

• The windchill in Massena, NY hit 33 below zero.

• Maine residents braced for nighttime readings down to 40 below zero.

• In Tallahasee, Florida, temperatures will hit the mid-20's, the lowest since 1977.

• Sioux City, S.D. hit a record low of 20 below zero.

• Chicago saw a record ninth consecutive day of snowfall with a high of three below.

• In Jackson County, Alabama, lows will hit a record low tonight of zero.

• Columbia, Missouri will see the coldest temperaturs in 23 years.

• Evansville, Indiana saw record cold with temperatures starting in the single digits.

• In Iowa, residents were warned that temperatures could drop as far as 27 below zero, matching the record set in 1972.

• Mt. Washington, New Hampshire air temperatures will hit 35 below with windchills reaching 75 to 80 below. That's a little shy of the record, set in 2004.

• Much of Wisconsin is experiencing near record cold, with 40 below windchills anticipated.

• And Europe is experiencing "the worst cold snap in decades."

• And in Pollock, S.D., the temperature has dropped to a record-setting 47 below zero. A gas station worker said it actually "hurts to breathe."

Laughingstock Al Gore, whose carbon trading bunko scam continues to unravel, was also having trouble breathing:

Gore’s church losing followers -- In 1971, perhaps entertaining thoughts of entering the full-time ministry, Al Gore, raised in and baptized into the Southern Baptist Church, entered the Vanderbilt Divinity School.

His sojourn was relatively brief. In three semesters, he enrolled in eight classes. He received an “F” as his grade in five of those classes. So, having failed out of school, he entered the family business, which was politics. But he apparently never lost his desire to enter a ministry, and since he couldn’t make the grade in the conventional sense, he did the next best thing. He started his own religion.

The result was the Church of Global Warming. With Gore as its high priest, the church was not long in establishing tenets of faith, nor in immediately branding those who refused to worship there as apostate.

[However] Sunspot activity, it appears, is on the wane, and the result has been a gradual cooling of Earth’s climate. Indeed, 2008 may be the first “coldest year” of the 21st century...

And Obama's "Global Warming" Czar -- a socialist who serves as a director for a company linked to carbon trading -- will likely try to proffer the deranged leftist strategy that the record cold is due to global warming.

No one's buying, honey.


Related: Copernicus, Einstein, Newton and Gore. Linked by: Denny, Ice Age Now and Belgium STUDS. Thanks! Hat tips: AP, WZTV, Daily Sentinel, The State, WCTV, JSonline, My Suburban Life and Hollywood Reporter.

Headline o' the day


Those Hitlers are some bad seeds
.

Crane operator needed


The Burj Dubai Skyscraper is the world's tallest at 2,788 feet (well over half a mile) and somewhere around 180 floors.


They're looking for crane operators to finish the top floors.


The gig only runs to the building's completion in December 2009 or until you suffer a fall.

Hat tip: Dave W.

Larwyn's Link Kerplosion: The Socialist Climate Czar's conflicting interests


Ayn Rand was right: WSJ
$2.5 trillion -- and counting: Bizzyblog
Change! Obama will stick to Bush Iraq Plan: Red State

Style Guide for Democrat Scandals: ¡No PasarÃn!
Destroying American from Within: Snapped Shot
Ted Strickland's pimp arrested: The Corner

Someone peed in Dowd's Kool-Aid: Dan Riehl
The British called: they want their guns back: YouTube
Helen Thomas: Jews == Nazis: Gateway Pundit

Dear World!: YouTube
Was data "proving" Global Warming massaged?: Landshape
Strategic Collapse at the Army War College: Pajamas Media (Patrick Poole)

Proposed Climate Czar is an out-of-the-closet Socialist!: Washington Times
Proposed Climate Czar could make $$$ from Carbon Trading!: Pirate's Cove
Proposed Treasury pick accepted reimbursement for taxes he didn't pay: National Review (Byron York)

McClatchy indignant at Joe the Plumber's reporting from Israel: McClatchy Watch
Because you cannot read the entire blergywebs as quickly as I can!: Mean ol' Meany
The POR (Pelosi-Obama-Reid) Economy: Pajamas Media (Tom Blumer)

Michelle Obama's 'vital' $300K hospital job quietly eliminated: Joshua Pundit
Leftist thinking: no waterboarding, even to save plane-loads of people: Atlas Shrugs
Palin reacts to Democrat plan to permanently ban drilling in ANWR: Gateway Pundit

History will show that George W. Bush was right: Telegraph:

The decisions taken by Mr Bush in the immediate aftermath of that ghastly moment will be pored over by historians for the rest of our lifetimes. One thing they will doubtless conclude is that the measures he took to lock down America's borders, scrutinise travellers to and from the United States, eavesdrop upon terrorist suspects, work closely with international intelligence agencies and take the war to the enemy has foiled dozens, perhaps scores of would-be murderous attacks on America. There are Americans alive today who would not be if it had not been for the passing of the Patriot Act. There are 3,000 people who would have died in the August 2005 airline conspiracy if it had not been for the superb inter-agency co-operation demanded by Bush after 9/11.

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Partisan disgrace Pelosi flips off 9/11 Commission's recommendations, compromises Homeland Security


Kenneth Timmerman writes:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s decision this week to pack the House intelligence committee with Democrats — despite a clear recommendation from the 9/11 commission to keep politics out of intelligence matters — has roiled Republicans.

Concerned by reports of the “politicization” of intelligence, the 9/11 commission recommended in July 2004 that the House and Senate intelligence committees be almost evenly balanced, regardless of the number of Republicans and Democrats in Congress... “The majority party’s representation on this committee should never exceed the minority’s representation by more than one,” the final report of the 9/11 Commission states on page 421...

... “Going to 13-8,” the new ratio in the House intelligence committee Pelosi announced on Tuesday, “means that she views the Intel committee the same way she views the Rules committee,” which she is ruling “with an iron fist,” [HPSCI ranking member, Rep. Pete] Hoekstra [said]... Hoekstra was careful to contrast Pelosi’s attitude with the treatment he and other Republicans have received so far from president-elect Obama and the transition team.

Let's see...

a) Closing Gitmo and returning terrorists to the battlefield... check.

b) Ending terrorist surveillance... check.

c) Terminating "don't ask, don't tell" in favor of political correctness... check.

d) Politicizing intelligence.. ka-boom!

Hey libs -- heaven forbid, if an American city goes up in flames -- you might want to peel those Obama-Biden stickers off of your cars.

Socialist UAW member thanks taxpayers: says bailout is "chump change" and calls for mass strikes


Writing in Socialist Alternative, UAW member Brett Haven expresses little gratitude to American taxpayers for $17 billion in bailout money that offered lifelines to GM and Chrysler.

The current crisis and government bailout is now threatening to destroy the decent living standards that the United Auto Workers (UAW) spent years struggling to achieve, and to establish a precedent of driving union work standards to non-union levels.

...while $700 billion was handed over to the banks with hardly any conditions, the $17 billion auto bailout came with harsh conditions for workers. UAW activist Gregg Shotwell describes it as “chump change for fast-track union busting.”

The final terms of the government loans signed by Bush call for reducing wages and benefits to the non-union levels at Honda, Toyota, and Nissan by the end of 2009, cutting more jobs and closing more factories, eliminating company-funded unemployment benefits, moving from set-benefit pensions to 401Ks, and allowing the companies to make half of their required payments into the union-run retiree healthcare funds (VEBAs) in company stock.

These new attacks will come on top of the historic concessions that were given up by the UAW in 2007, which included cutting wages for new hires in half and putting the responsibility for retiree healthcare on the union, as well as plant closings and the loss of tens of thousands of jobs...

Instead of closing factories, we should be demanding to convert them to socially useful production... [Ed: we've finally solved the mystery and answered the question: what are 'green collar jobs'?]

...The only way autoworkers can secure a decent future for themselves and their families is by organizing a fight-back. The UAW should be mobilizing its membership for a fight, reaching out to local communities, the labor movement, and the wider working class for solidarity... But for any fight-back to take place, it will require rank-and-file activists organizing in their factories and communities against concessions and job losses. Only a movement from below, demanding a better future for autoworkers and society as a whole, can win this fight...

...The real problem is that most American workers don’t make enough. In fact, the root cause of the current economic crisis is that workers can’t buy back what they produce. Despite productivity rising over 60% across the entire economy, wages have declined for most workers over the past 30 years. We should be fighting to raise all workers’ living standards, not blaming those who can still make a living.

Tell you what, Haevin, move to Zimbabwe. I hear it's a frickin' workers' paradise.

Dear World. Please don't get upset.


A must-watch, albeit from a firebrand.

Click to watch it all.

Related: What really happened?

Why won't Jan Schakowsky and Emil Jones return my calls?


My new column for Pajamas Media is up.

It's a sordid little tale of love, politics and apparent slush funds in Illinois politics.

And you can only find the latest breaking scandal info here.

Larywn's Link Kerplosion: CNN's video fraud


Best of CES: CNet
Pretty talk and ugly realities: Thomas Sowell
Got public health?: Detroit Receiving

'Hammer and Sickle' Thinkers: Bob McCarty
Hamas leaders cower in hospital built by Israel: LGF
61 Gitmo grads returned to terror: Gateway Pundit

Blogger uncovers possible CNN video fraud: INN
Ten things Bush got right: Weekly Standard (Fred Barnes)
Difference between Hamas and Israel:
Real Clear Politics

Hamas is responsible: Commentary (Michael J. Totten)
The end of the Internet as we know it: Pajamas Media (Tom Hayes)
First Zune freezes, now WMP12 beta can corrupt your MP3s: Ars Technica

Hamas prefers war as an alternative to progress: National Post (Sami Alrabaa):

...We Arabs have learned nothing from the two major disastrous wars against Israel. Some of us still believe that the Israelis understand only the language of defiance and violence. Violence is the only “argument” we possess. Rational, realistic thinking has never been a part of our discourse and action.

Especially Islamists, they rejoice at the on-going maiming and killing in Gaza, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq. None of those Hamas-sympathizers has ever condemned the atrocities inflicted upon innocent people, arbitrarily killed in these countries by suicide bombers in the name Islam...

...According to a clandestine survey by Bielefeld University conducted in Syria and Egypt (2006), over 70% of the population in these countries want peace with Israel. They are “sick and tired”, as many put it, of the belligerent discourse of the Islamists and the biased and instigatory propaganda of their national media. They, of course, don’t dare say that openly...

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Ruh roh: Al Sharpton goes to war with the unions


Someone pinch me: yesterday Al Sharpton was on the op-ed page of The Wall Street Journal. Praising No Child Left Behind (NCLB). And fighting the unions.

...we staunchly support NCLB's core concept that schools should be held accountable for boosting student performance. Dismissing the potential of schools to substantially boost minority achievement, as is now fashionable in some Democratic circles, is ultimately little more than a recipe for defeatism... ...we also support expanding parental choice. High-performing urban charter schools such as the KIPP (Knowledge Is Power Program) schools are showing that minority students can close the achievement gap if given access to high-quality instruction.

Of course, the powerful teachers' unions don't support charter schools for the obvious reason: accountability. Combining standardized testing (the gold standard for education at every level) with competition? That's bound to scare the bejeebers out of Union bosses everywhere.

Consider the proven results of charter schools thus far (PDF), despite the best efforts of the Union bosses to suppress competition:

• In Milwaukee, voucher students exhibited an 8 percentile point gain in math after four years.9

• In Dayton, African-American students gained 6.5 percentile points after two years.10

• In Washington, D.C., African-American students gained 9.2 percentile points after two years.11

• In Charlotte, students gained about 6 percentile points in both math and reading after one year.12

Students in public schools facing voucher competition exhibit gains as well:

• In Florida, public schools whose students are eligible for vouchers made gains 5 percentile points greater than schools not facing competition.13

• In Milwaukee, schools faced by voucher competition exhibited gains that were 3.4 percentile points greater than those made by schools not facing competition.14

• In Edgewood ISD in San Antonio, graduation rates have increased in six of seven years since the privately-funded HORIZON scholarship program began, rising from 60 percent to 75 percent since 1999.15

Competition and data: the Democrat's two worst enemies.

Copernicus, Einstein, Newton and Gore


In a Baltimore Sun letter to the editor, Dr. Mark Campbell, a professor of chemistry at the U.S. Naval Academy, offered a stunning comparison.

According to the editorial "A New Year's resolution" (Jan. 2), tens of thousands of scientists like me are "flat-earth types."

I guess my doctorate in chemical physics from Johns Hopkins doesn't give me nearly the qualifications to analyze the science associated with the global climate as an editor with an agenda.

If we are going to stoop to name-calling, an appropriate name for people with the view The Baltimore Sun endorses could be "Chicken Littles." But instead of claiming that the sky is falling, they claim the sky is burning.

The editorial claims that there is a consensus among scientists that man-made carbon dioxide is causing global climate change; however, consensus in science is an oxymoron. From Galileo to Einstein, one scientist with proof is more convincing than thousands of other scientists who believe something to be true.

And I don't even grant that there is a consensus among scientists; it's just that the press only promotes the global warming alarmists and ignores or minimizes those of us who are skeptical. To many of us, there is no convincing evidence that carbon dioxide produced by humans has any influence on the Earth's climate.

Arguing that our country should decrease its use of fossil fuels is a laudable goal, but the reason to do so should be to reduce our reliance on energy from foreign sources, not to reduce the danger from some imaginary boogeyman.

The sky is not burning, and to claim that it is amounts to journalistic malpractice.

Al Gore, who refuses to debate because the "science is settled", was unavailable for comment.

Update: Lou Dobbs and CNN cover global cooling and the global warming grifters.

Via Marc, who adds just a couple of links for the global warming bunko scam artists:

It is growing nearly impossible to keep up with the numerous studies and developments refuting man-made warming fears and the growing number of scientists publicly dissenting. See this small sampling of very recent inconvenient climate studies and real world developments: Sunspots have been predicting major cooling since 2000 - New paper: Sunspot data vital clue to climate change - ‘Record levels’ of Co2 unable to stop record cold! - Pravda: Earth on the Brink of an Ice Age - 'Earth's average temperature showed no detectable warming from December 1978 until the 1997 El Nino' - - Report: Cause of warming solved? Clinton/Gore administration saw temps soar! J (great chart) - Another Dissenter: 'AGW theory has spectacularly failed!' (Frank Tipler, the distinguished mathematical physicist at Tulane University) - Climate models are no more intelligent than the dishwasher in the kitchen, claims South African professor Will Alexander - Greenland ice melt 'may only be a temporary phenomenon' - Ice Core Sites In Greenland Show Snow Levels Rising - Polar Sea Ice Changes are Having a Net Cooling Effect on the Climate - Gaia Hypothesis called 'fairy-tale' – Scientist says 'Natural world is a doomsday device careening from one cataclysm to another' -- 'Earth needs humans to save it! - Pielke Jr.  on peer-review: 'Many studies get far more rigorous peer review on blogs after publication than in journals' - Analysis: The UN IPCC Numbers Game: 4000 scientists = 60 scientistsStudy finds Sea Level Rise Slows by 20% - Lower than IPCC Estimates! - 'No evidence for accelerated sea-level rise' says Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute - Defying Predictions, Sea Level Rise Begins to Slow - MIT & Northwestern U. Study find: Climate Change Wouldn't hurt America's Economy - NCDC: the U.S. cool down by 0.49 °F per decade - 2008 will be coolest year of the decade globally! - Falsifying the Global Warming Hypothesis The global tropical cyclone season of 2008: below average - Canada's forests, once huge help on greenhouse gases, now contribute to climate change - Global Sea Ice Ends Year at Same Level as 1979 - Claim: 'Right-wing propaganda machine' winning - Setbacks in the Fight Against Global Warming - Reality Check: Politically Left Scientists Now Rejecting Climate Fears - Indians don't believe in global warming! - 'Global warming is natural, enjoy it' Declares Indian Geologist'Global cooling will lead to our extinction' - NASA Moonwalker Joins Climate Skeptics Despite Gore's Claim Skeptics Believe Moon Landing was 'Staged' - Small sampling of recent global cold - January Snow-cover Again Highest Since 1967, Running Ahead of 2008 - No Joke: Air America alarmist Thom Hartmann claims cold evidence of warming! (Audio clip) - Another Dissenter: Meteorologist says CO2 not 'dragging temps up' - Predicts Global COOLING - Atmosphere Scientist Dr. Roger Pielke Sr. slaps down UK Met Office - Professor laments climate 'hype' --concedes she is ' increasingly ill at ease about the debate - Singer: Bias in IPCC Reports Exposed by Atmospheric Scientist Dr. Fred Singer - Climate-change alarmism runs into a reality check - Claims of impending marine species extinctions due to CO2 Warming Refuted by real-world evidence - Princeton professor fired by Gore says warming fear promotion ‘has turned into a cult' - U.S. Senate Minority report of over 650 (and growing) dissenting international scientists

Most awesome text message ever


CNet's Steven Musil relates the story of the bestest text message ever:

An Ohio man used a friend's cell phone to get back his car, cell phone, and cash, all of which were stolen in a car jacking, according to a local TV report. Alan Heuss was sitting in his running BMW in Columbus on Wednesday when an armed man opened a passenger door, stuck a gun in his face, and made off with his stuff.

After filing a police report, Heuss was meeting with some friends to drown his sorrows when one suggested that they try to contact the thieves by texting Heuss' stolen cell phone.

"He said, 'I'm going to text these guys, I'm going to blow some smoke their way,'" Heuss told the station. "He said, 'I'm going to tell them I've got a bunch of hot chicks, as if I'm texting you, and that we've got some drugs, too.'"

The carjacking suspects fell for the ruse and went to an address sent to them by Heuss' friend just seven hours after the carjacking. But instead of the "hot chick with drugs" they were expecting, they were met with by cops with cuffs.

Helpful idiots that they were, the carjackers were kind enough to return with the car when they showed up for the big party.

Maybe it ended up in the spam folder


I guess the Iranians didn't get the memo on hope and change.

After all, didn't CNN's 'experts' incessantly tell us that Obama's message of world unity would "rebrand America" and improve our standing in the world?

And didn't the brilliant Con Coughlin say so?

Along with rocket scientist Daniel W. Drezner?

And reknowned foreign policy genius Amy Zalman?

As well as the towering intellectual giant, Patrick Leahy?

Oops.

Inauguration Porta-Potty Shortage? Obama Inauguration Pants to the rescue!


Updated with newly reported Drone-to-Porta-Potty Ratio!: Larwyn tells me that the inauguration will be a disaster if all the people who plan to come do. Calculations today of the area where the events are taking place indicate their will be one toilet for ever 8,000 people.

As an unrepentant Capitalist, I'll be selling these Obama Inauguration Pants™ (also sold as It all Depends) for the bargain price of only $29.99 per box.



If you need any coupons, let me know.

Update: Even police officers plan on using 'em.



Idea: May Bee at Just One Minute.

Larwyn's Links: "Come on, Obama, what kind of Democrat are you?"


Why does the New York Times love Hamas?: Daily Beast
Hamas in their own words: YouTube
BBC-owned station: it's perfectly okay to kill Israeli kids: YWL

Violence in New York: Atlas Shrugs
Hamas spokesman gets pwnt on global television: Israel Matzav
Senate Dems oppose energy independence: Bob McCarty

Hollywood Squares: The Anchoress
The Megapenny Project: Kokogiak
The Media collude in terrorist crimes against humanity: American Thinker (James Lewis)

Powering a Google search (much greener than the critics say): GoogleBlog
Global warming: What is the scientific truth?: Mainichi Daily News
Obama Global Warming Czarina's socialist ties disappear: Jammie Wearing Fool

Why Don’t I Care About the Palestinians?: National Review (John Derbyshire - 2002)
Today I am a Jew: GM's Place
The Peace Process is in Jeopardy? I wonder why!: Barry Rubin

Cool Cat: The Atlantic (Christopher Hitchens)
Californians look for the exits: Yahoo! News
Obama intelligence adviser involved in security breach: Kenneth Timmerman

A New Circus Comes to Town. They're going to need more than three rings.: Weekly Standard (PJ O'Rourke)

Is it too soon to talk about the failed Obama presidency just because Obama isn't president yet? That depends upon how quickly Barack Obama is able to apply the lessons he's learned from Management Secrets of the Illinois Governors. So far he's not doing very well. He has allowed America's current number one jackleg, crackpot, smut-mouth, slime-licking politician to give the Obama Senate seat to a lovable old African-American doofus whom no one has the heart to execrate. Roland Burris will be the kind of ornament to this year's Senate that the broken plastic Rudolph with its antlers missing was to last year's Christmas tree.

Then Obama took Bill Richardson--one of his earliest important supporters and among the smartest, most experienced, and, certainly, most affable of Washington insiders--and put Bill at the Department of Commerce... Even a Blagojevich knows that Washington isn't Chicago. In Washington you don't place a loyal and able political ally in some obscure public office to garner campaign contribution boodle from local highway contractors. And--oops, that seems to have been the problem with the Bill Richardson nomination.

Come on, Obama, what kind of Democrat are you? I thought Democrats were supposed to be good at this stuff. It's us Republicans who stink at political corruption.