AGW Twofer: CBS Reports The CRU Scandal Truthfully and CEI Files Papers To Sue NASA

As Bunk noted in the comments to the Harry_Read_Me post, CBS, that bastion of evenhanded news reporting, has actually reported on the repercussions of the CRU data release–including the significance of Harry. Well, color me yellow and squeeze my lemon:

CRU wields outsize influence: it claims the world’s largest temperature data set, and its work and mathematical models were incorporated into the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s 2007 report. That report, in turn, is what the Environmental Protection Agency acknowledged it “relies on most heavily” when concluding that carbon dioxide emissions endanger public health and should be regulated.

But wait–There’s more. This morning, Chris Horner announced that on behalf of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, he had filed three notices of intent to sue NASA and the Goddard Institute for Space Studies for failing to honor FOIA requests about AGW data going back three years. But the real comedy is Horner’s request for documents…

relating to the content, importance or propriety of workday-hour posts or entries by GISS/NASA employee Gavin A. Schmidt on the weblog or “blog” RealClimate, which is owned by the advocacy Environmental Media Services and was started as an effort to defend the debunked “Hockey Stick” that is so central to the CRU files. RealClimate.org is implicated in the leaked files, expressly offered as a tool to be used “in any way you think would be helpful” to a certain advocacy campaign, including an assertion of Schmidt’s active involvement in, e.g., delaying and/or screening out unhelpful input by “skeptics” attempting to comment on claims made on the website.

This and the related political activism engaged in are inappropriate behavior for a taxpayer-funded employee, particularly on taxpayer time. These documents were requested in January 2007 and NASA/GISS have refused to date to comply with their legal obligation to produce responsive documents.

BWUHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

[Via http://cbullitt.wordpress.com]

The Russians are Coming (And Thank God for That!)

Sean Gabb

How’s this for a conspiracy theory? The 61Mb of climate change fraud evidence was hacked by the Russians. They had the means, motive and opportunity.

Means and Opportunity: Just because the Cold War is over doesn’t mean the Russian security services have become any less efficient than they used to be – nor that all those connections with lefties in the universities have entirely lapsed.

Motive: Climate change is all nonsense so far as we are supposed to be the villains. However, the sort of funding poured by Western governments into developing alternative energy sources might actually get somewhere. Bearing in mind that Russia is kept afloat solely by its oil and gas exports, the Russians have every reason to want to shut this research down.

Add to this that the data was first put up on a Russian site, and I find the case most persuasive.

Good on you, Mr Putin. It’s too late for the KGB to apologise to all the people it murdered. But if it has now joined the forces of light in the climate change debate, there may be an element of redemption.

[Via http://libertarianalliance.wordpress.com]

Podcast: Id Card's, Why Why Why?

So it is really happening, Manchester is to get ID cards in two weeks time. Not quite sure why Manchester is the Guinea Pig for this initiative after the failure of the congestion charge, something about an above average amount of young people or something, but anyway heres my podcast on the debate:

Click here to listen

Oh and heres a video explaining a bit about them:

[Via http://alaintolhurst.wordpress.com]

Inflation, The Governments Hidden Tax. Our Problem

I tossed my own spin on this and added a video, but my source for this was Chris Brady’s blog. You should check it out in my blog roll Inflation is a hidden government tax that they can issue when ever they want without having to go through legislation or congress. Inflation is the result of money being printed out of thin air when there is no demand for that money in the economy. ie an expansion of a money supply that exceeds the demand for that money.

You might think to yourself (or even worse, out loud) that we do need more money! That’s not true. While we could always use more money for things like a 100 square inch t.v., helicopters, video games, cable and eating out for every meal of every day, but we do not have a real need for that money. The actual demand for money in an economy is limited. For example, if you can live off from $10.00 a day and survive, then that is all that the demand is for the total supply of money for that day (obviously on a larger scale when talking about a whole country, but it boils down to the same end result). If you go to the bank and withdraw more than $10.00 than you have just increased the demand for money for that day. But, at the same time Larry down the street has deposited some of his $10.00 for the day and thus off sets your withdrawal.  Can we agree that withdrawals and deposits are opposite of each other? Well then, the net result of deposits and withdrawals at any given time is equal to the demand for money at that moment. So if more deposits are made than withdrawls then the demand is less. And if more withdrawals are made than deposits then the demand is… Good you’re getting it.

So, if an economy is doing well and expanding then there would be a need for more money. More people, business, more manufacturing and production = the need for a bigger money supply to equal the growing economy. Which by the way are all great things. Do you remember when we had economic growth? Sense we do not have any of this, then we do not have the need for more money being printed into our economy. We do not have a growing economy. We do not require more base money (that $10 you need to live). But, the government still prints it faster than it is demanded. Because of this banks have higher reserves. Why? Well, you  guessed it, because there is more money on hand because there is no demand of it from the people. So they are forced to lower their interest rates to appeal to consumers to borrow. Then the borrower takes the money and spends it right? Throwing it back into the economy. This is where some people are confused(congress?) , “Well we need the money in the economy to help stimulate it again.” And boy does that money make its way back into the economy alright, but to the dismay of the masses. Now there is more money than is needed (more than before),thus now there are more dollars fighting for the same products as before. If you are a business man than this is a no brainer. More money in the economy means you can raise your prices. My ho ho’s go to the highest bidder. The result is a huge price increase, and that is not inflation, but a direct result from inflation. Remember, inflation is the expansion of the money supply beyond what is needed or demanded at the moment by the economy.

Now that we have a raise in prices for the same products and services, not new ones, we have just plain “Higher Prices”. The reason for this again is…more money than is demanded in the economy. Everyone has more money now, so they can pay more. Now sense there is more money floating around the value of the dollar has decreased. I used to pay a $1.00 for a bag of potato chips, now I pay $1.30 for the exact same bag of chips. Or, maybe you’ve noticed products that have gone up just a fraction, yet the serving size or amount that you used to get has shrunk.

Now that the dollar has been devalued because of prices going up. This means the spending power of the dollar has decreased. Sense the establishment of the Federal Reserve in 1913 our dollar has inflated 25 times. For those of you who don’t get it, let me explain. Our dollar today is worth only $.04 (four cents) compared to the dollar in 1913. Ouch. Where’s the other $.96? The government stole it brothas and sistas. They made it, issued it and stole it back.

“Nah Ha, not my government.” Yes your government. Your government that has always had a nack for spending money uncontrollably. More than it brings in. As did you and I. But, we go bankrupt, the government has their own printing press! They just print more money to pay their bills. When we do that it’s called counterfeiting. When they do it they call it “Monetary Policy”.

So now that they have gone and devalued our dollar their debts are actually smaller. When they borrowed a gazillion dollars from China our dollar was worth X. Now when we pay it back it is worth Y.  You think that you can play this game friend? Well you can’t. Wages are the last thing to go up. Prices go up way faster and you lose buying power. Tough break.

So when I say that the government has access to your 401k, IRA, savings and checking accounts and even that wad of cash under your mattress I’m not kidding. I just hope that some of you start paying a bit more attention to whats really going on, and stop thinking that government is any type of “Good” answer to your problems, because in all reality their mostly the reason behind them.

Opinions That Offend

Should freedom of speech have self-imposed boundaries?  Especially when airing opinions cause distance and sometimes alienation in relationships? I’ve been thinking recently about the consequences of posting on a public forum and unabashedly sharing such opinions.  As Abe Lincoln knew, some of them popular to some, but not all; some of them repellent or offensive to some, but not all.  An opinion is nothing more than a personal belief.  As such, it vexes me why stating one’s opinion could ever offend another person.  I suppose opinions run the whole gamut of casual musings to utter vehemency and benign remarks about a group or person to truly malicious ones.  For practical purposes, let’s say one is just stating a belief which this person clearly believes in to the nth degree.  Perhaps an opinion stated with such surity  seems like an insult to anyone who would disagree and have similar depth of belief in their opinion.  This is where we start treading into a dangerous briar patch though.   The only reason I can imagine someone being offended over someone else’s opinion would be that a) either he felt the person was stating their opinion as fact or b) he felt that his opinions, after invested in and developed as a result of years of experience and research, were actually facts.  This is where we get into trouble, intolerance and separation.  Suddenly, we are holding our ‘opinions’ aloft as the Gospel and by choosing to be offended by others, we are in essence saying that there is no room for them.  We have already found the Holy Grail of truth and any others who disagree are clearly “misguided” or “confused.” 

Anger and defiance over someone’s opinion (usually equally as strong), when it does not match with our own is nothing short of intolerance and arrogance.  How can we get to a place where we agree to disagree?  Whatever happened to those days of true and gallant civility? Why does disagreeing with a person have to call into question their very validity and perspective as an individual human being?  Do we really believe that only 5%, 10% or even 80% have a monopoly on all of the ‘correct’ opinions or beliefs.  Opinions are not facts; to blur this line and begin to impose them on others with fervor or to take offense at a statement of opposing belief is ludicrous. 

Let’s look at the definition of freedom up close:

freedom 1. the state of being free or at liberty rather than in confinement or under physical restraint: 2. exemption from external control, interference, regulation, etc. 3. the absence of or release from ties, obligations, etc 4. ease or facility of movement or action: to enjoy the freedom of living in the country. 5. Philosophy. the power to exercise choice and make decisions without constraint from within or without; autonomy; self-determination.

What strikes me the most: an exemption from external control, interference or regulation; also, an absence or release from ties or obligations the power to exercise choice and make decisions without constraint from within or without; autonomy; self-determination.  Let’s apply this definition to speech and airing of one’s opinions.  In order to have true freedom of speech, one needs to feel free to air one’s beliefs and opinions without punishment or constraints from the outside.  This could be in the form of a withdrawal of friendship or love if you’re stating opinions that are not inalignment with theirs religiously, politically or morally.  To an extreme, one might also face constraints of a grave nature like a censored  internet if opinions and beliefs shared are not in alignment with the agenda of the governemental powers that be, physical threats or death.  As human beings, we like to pay lip service to freedom of speech and encourage people to do so, but after they speak we punish them in myriad ways if their beliefs are in disagreement with ours.  How can we make another person’s beliefs moot?  It is impossible.  Each individual soul has just as much right as anyone else to be on this planet.  We all have our individual lessons to learn and at different rates.  I do not believe that there are a select few who after much refinement, study or soul-searching has finally found all of the answers that have plagued man or even none of the answers.  We do have our experiences, our hearts and our beliefs – and no one can ever question or disparage those.  Punishment for expressing the ‘wrong’ opinions is oppression, pure and simple.  So the next time someone’s opinion pushes your button and you find yourself getting  self-righteous and defiant, let’s take a step back and pause, and remember that there is enough room for all opinions and beliefs without one cancelling another out.  Who knows, through exercising tolerance, we may even find ourselves loosening our grip on our own beliefs long enough to open our minds and hearts to truly listen and make room for others at the table.

Back to birdshot blogging

I’ve got a rant on wealth destruction and Generalovernment Motors stewing in my mid-brain; for now, here’s some neat shit from around the big truck*.

——

Remember the uproar from late this May, when Canadian Governor-General Michaëlle Jean ate raw seal heart?  Get ready for some more pants-shitting hysteria from the grass-eaters:

• Parliamentary restaurant serves up seal meat (Globe and Mail)

Seal meat is about to join beef tenderloin and baked salmon on the haute-cuisine menu for MPs and senators in the parliamentary restaurant.  MPs say Parliament is picking up the fork from Governor-General Michäelle Jean, who triggered a global controversy last May by gobbling seal meat in a show of support for Inuit culture in the Arctic.

(Image link goes to original source)

——

Next, we have a blinding flash of the obvious from Dr. WhiteCoat as he advances an idea that might actually work:

• Have at it (WhiteCoat’s Call Room)

As I was fixing the wiring in my basement, a thought popped into my head about another way to decrease costs of medical care in this country.

Get rid of prescription requirements for most medications and procedures.

How many people would go to the doctor for a sore throat if they could buy a strep test over the counter? If the strep test is positive, they go to the pharmacy and purchase some penicillin over the counter.  If you twisted your ankle and could walk into a radiography center and get an x-ray of your ankle for $100, would you bypass the emergency department?  If you could buy your blood pressure medication over the counter, would you keep going to your doctor for those $150 checkups? Would you even purchase routine insurance? Or would you stick with just “major medical” coverage?

That makes far too much sense to be actually implemented.

The natural objection (from certain quarters — those Hayek named as “socialists of all parties”) is that people don’t know what’s good for them and must be vetted, advised, nudged, guided, prodded, compelled, verified, examined, and monitored by proper experts… for their own good, of course.  WhiteCoat notes (not unreasonably) that a fully-open system has risks:

I know that issues would have to be worked out with an open access system – such as preventing narcotic abuse and preventing antibiotic resistance due to people taking Zithromax for the flu or Levaquin for their coughs. Maybe we’d have to limit the number of CT scans or angiograms that someone may receive to keep down the radiation doses.

However, there are precedents, and it is in precedent that his introduction rises from irrelevance to shine with the blinding light of “of course… why didn’t I think of that?”

In almost any other situation, if I choose to take care of a problem myself, I can do it.

If I want to cut my own hair, I get a pair of scissors, look in the mirror, and start hacking. I don’t need a stylist’s prescription to purchase scissors.

If I want to sue someone, I can go to court, fill out the papers, pay the filing fee, and play the lotto. I don’t need a lawyer’s OK in order to gain entrance to the court house.

If I need to fix an electric outlet, I can go read about it online, buy the stuff at Home Depot, then hope I don’t get the red and the blue wires mixed up. I don’t need an electrician’s permission to purchase conduit.

When I get in over my head doing any of these things, I either take my chances or I call someone who knows more about the problem than I do.

Why should medicine be any different?

It would be interesting to explore the history of medicine’s regulation and find out how medicine became “any different”.  Sounds like another job for the Glib Dilettante to half-finish.

——

Moving from medicine to economics, we find that Eric Crampton has unearthed a pair of papers on immigration:

• Immigration (Offsetting Behaviour)

First, Giovanni Peri finds that immigration in the US doesn’t crowd out natives’ employment; rather, increases in total factor productivity from increased immigration work to raise income per worker.

You mean the myth of the great American melting-pot as a land of opportunity isn’t entirely mythological?  Comparative advantage works?  Say it ain’t so! (Emphasis in quotation added.)

So if immigration actually makes people richer — even the people who’d likely be seen as in competition with the immigrants — why do batshit xenophobes like Pat Buchanan and Lou Dobbs even exist?

Next, David Card, Christian Dustmann and Ian Preston find that folks in Europe oppose immigration less because of worries about pecuniary effects on wages and more because of what he calls “compositional amenities” – people, especially the low-educated, value the characteristics of their coworkers, schools, and neighbours, and just dislike foreigners on those margins.

Oh, of course.  It’s because “they’re different”.

Here’s the thing, though: if you go off on a shrill  hysterical rant about how different those hard-working immigrants who moved in next door are, and how they don’t share your core cultural values, you just come across as a narrow-minded asshole.  (Not that this stops anyone.)  But if you go off on a shrill  hysterical rant about how those hard-working immigrants who moved in next door are stealing your jobs!!!!11one, you can get your victim-mentality on, and claiming victim status is how people get ahead these days.

——

And speaking of shrill hysterical people who embrace known-bad political-economic views and plead persecution when they go wrong, Megan McArdle has some bad news about Venezuela’s strongman Hugo Chavez:

• Chavez’s economic problems turn nasty

President Hugo Chávez has been facing a public outcry in recent weeks over power failures that, after six nationwide blackouts in the last two years, are cutting electricity for hours each day in rural areas and in industrial cities like Valencia and Ciudad Guayana. Now, water rationing has been introduced here in the capital.The deterioration of services is perplexing to many here, especially because the country had grown used to cheap, plentiful electricity and water in recent decades. But even as the oil boom was enriching his government and Mr. Chávez asserted greater control over utilities and other industries in this decade, public services seemed only to decay, adding to residents’ frustrations.

[...]

This comes on top of the sporadic food shortages that result from price controls combined with high inflation.

So suppose you’re one of Michael Moore’s anointed anticapitalist democrats, and the Gods of the Copybook Headings are booking hotels in Caracas.  What do you do?

Well, naturally you ramp up the bellicose bloviation against one of your neighbours!

Chavez’s solution to these problem has been to go militaristic on neighboring Columbia.

[...]

No one thinks war is imminent; they think it’s just bluster to stir up patriotism and channel it through the figure of one Hugo Chavez.  But then, as the article points out, no one really thought Argentina would invade the Falklands, either.

There’s a cheery thought.

——

* Hey, Ted Stevens?  Fuck you.

Advent Can't Come Soon Enough

Planning Ahead for the Advent Season 

If you’ve paid attention to recent posts, perhaps you’ve noticed that I have been in “Advent” mode for almost a month and its just the middle of November. I can’t explain it- maybe it is due to the year we’ve witnessed since last Advent and the urgency I feel to witness to the Incarnation Event to all who will give an ear, pointing to that event as the most signifcant of all events in this present world. 

The Coming of the Promised Deliverer

Once again this year, I am going to post about the resources over at The General Board of Disciplehip of the UMC. Here is a little teaser along with the link for planning for Advent, including the Scripture texts and the themes of worship:

“Advent places us into the sweep of the Eternal One breaking into history, awakens us to the radical disjuncture between God’s dream for creation and the mess we have made of it, and challenges us to join God’s mission to make all things new.Especially after this year of so much economic upheaval, it may be the ancient call of the Advent message, rather than the ephemeral call to recreate the “perfect Christmastime,” that the church and the people around us most need to hear and heed.

“The days are surely coming,” Jeremiah reminds. “Even so, come Lord Jesus,” the church in Revelation replies. May our reply this season join that of all the saints, here and now and in the age to come.

ADVENT PLANNING 2009 - I encourage you to check out the resources and the orientation unless you already have found your own. At the beginning of the Christian year (for most) is a great time to actively participate with Christians the world over the Gift of the Son of God, Jesus the promised Christ.