Sunday, February 14. 2010
Climategate's Phil Jones Confesses to Climate Fraud. For starters,
Imagine a man who has spent the better part of the past 25 years toiling to convince the world of CO2-forced 20th-century warming now admitting that the difference in warming rates for the periods 1860-1880, 1910-40 and 1975-2009 is statistically insignificant. Jones even acceded that there has been no statistically-significant global warming since 1995; that in fact, global temperatures have been trending to the downside since January of 2002, although he denied the statistical significance of the -0.12C per decade decline.
All the details at link above. And he said:
And he said that for the past 15 years there has been no ‘statistically significant’ warming.
Related, IPCC admits that they are not a scientific organization.
Related, World may not be warming, say scientists. Al Gore, Call your Agent.
Their party is over. My big question is "Why aren't the Warmists pleased and relieved to learn that it was a giant hoax perpetrated by grant-seekers, rent-seekers, carbon-credit investors like Al Gore and the oil companies, greedy governments, and the absurd, corrupt, and amoral UN?" Why not celebrate! They should be thrilled to know that they can quit worrying, and just get on with life.
But it just seems to make them more angry. Go figger. Maybe some people just like to be angry and upset about something or other to give life a bigger meaning.
Eros (Cupid) - "desire" - is the mischievous prankster son of Venus who, at the same time, is responsible for keeping humanity thriving. He is, indeed, a troublemaker and a pest, isn't he, with his devilish little arrows and bow? As Kesler and I observed the other day, those little arrows can hit you at the oddest, most unsuspecting moments. Like at the supermarket.
You can refresh your memory of the folktale of Cupid and Psyche here.
This is Caravaggio's c. 1600 Eros Victorious:
The Valentine sweetheart of Maggie's Farm is our dearly loved commenter Marianne Matthews.
Marianne is a classically trained musician, among many other wonderful things, with a sane, quick, and fun-loving mind. I share Marianne's love of folk music, she broadening my appreciations beyond the labor and protest songs I was raised with to older and other countries' folk classics. Marianne has been deeply involved with many of the greats. Marianne sent me a disc of some of her recaptured recordings from the 1950's, which you have to hear to soar. We're working on a way to put at least one up at Maggie's Farm. Meanwhile, you'll have to be content with this 1972 photo of Marianne and all-together now wishing Marianne a Happy Valentine.
FRIENDSHIP
Oh, the comfort -- the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person,
Having neither to weigh thoughts,
Nor measure words -- but pouring them
All right out -- just as they are --
Chaff and grain together --
Certain that a faithful hand will
Take and sift them --
Keep what is worth keeping --
And with the breath of kindness
Blow the rest away.
-Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
Saturday, February 13. 2010
Poof! You're in the union. Right when you thought you were your own boss.
h/t, Theo
Steyn. A quote re the USA:
...the difference between America and Europe is that, when the global economy nosedived, everywhere from Iceland to Bulgaria mobs took to the streets and besieged Parliament, demanding to know why government didn't do more for them. This is the only country in the developed world where a mass movement took to the streets to say we can do just fine if you control-freak statists would just stay the hell out of our lives, and our pockets. You can shove your non-stimulating stimulus, your jobless jobs bill, and your multitrillion-dollar porkathons. This isn't karaoke. These guys are singing "I'll do it my way" for real.
Somehow, this post got Farked! Just realized it. Hey, Fark friends - check out our site while visiting. You might enjoy knowing us and our free-thinking Yankee site -
It's Valentine's Day weekend, so go out and buy your hubby some really good smokes. Get some for your kids, too. Maybe beloved hubby will get a good one for you, too: a pretty lady looks sexy with a cigar. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.
Why our pro-smoking campaign this week? It's a companion-piece to Michelle O's anti-obesity campaign. A good cigar, which lasts at least quadruple the time of a Wendy's burger (450 calories), has zero calories and quadruple the enjoyment.
(By the way, I do not know what the fuss is about childhood obesity. I drive past our local high school all the time, and I have yet to see a fat kid. They all look kinda scrawny to me except for the muscular athletes.) I always told my kids "Do not eat vegetables. They are for grown-ups." That was the truth and it worked well. Still having trouble getting them to enjoy the mystic Indian miracle of organic tobacco, though. They are brainwashed.
I plan to light up a tasty, sweet, well-aged and fragrant Dominican Bolivar this afternoon. Bolivar builds a heck of a strong, solid cigar, like a piece of wood. They have become my favorites for the moment. It's fun to rustle through ye olde Yankee humidors to see what you have, and what you forgot you bought online a year or three ago. It is sort of like a wine cellar, filled with interesting, anti-obesity suprises.
Photo: A fair likeness of your News Junkie at Cannon Mountain this winter, with his few remaining brain cells well-protected after a nasty run-in with a hostile tree in early January.
Remember the Global Cooling hysteria? Well, Rare snowfall in Rome as cold snap grips Italy
Vibrator addiction?
Addicted to growing opium. Is it a Libertarian thing?
Licenses to use the internet? (h/t, Insty)
Homeland Sec refuses to use the I word. It might offend, I guess. The problem is that this sort of baloney offends me, and insults my intelligence. Plus I am paying for it.
VDH: The New Commandments on the Animal Farm Barn Wall
Putin Orders Obama Not to Defend America. Like Iran, the Russians see the O as a pussy to be pushed around. Yes, we did just call the O a pussy.
Re Sowell's Intellectuals and Society
Tough love for Greece:
Members of both government and opposition parties in the Bundestag said there would be no parliamentary support for any financial rescue package for Greece without clear evidence of drastic cuts in state spending. Eurozone finance ministers are due to meet on Monday, but no detailed rescue plan will be on their agenda.
Re NJ, at Tiger:
One state retiree, 49 years old, paid, over the course of his entire career, a total of $124,000 towards his retirement pension and health benefits. What will we pay him? $3.3 million in pension payments over his life and nearly $500,000 for health care benefits -- a total of $3.8m on a $120,000 investment. Is that fair?
Pretending that it was not the Dems who were blocking civil rights
Chose your side: Salmon vs. farmers. Not enuf water for both.
Joe Biden: We did it
Laurence Tribe via Surber:
“Laurence Tribe, one of the most brilliant lawyers in America, has said that Barack is the most incandescently brilliant student he ever taught. I think brains count. When you combine it with the kind of international background that he’s had, what’s he’s been through as a black person. It has not made him angry, but he’s rather hopeful by it. He’s an extremely positive person about the future of America. He’s the president I’ve been waiting for all my life.”
Get a room, Laurence.
Re the anti-obesity campaign:
"As the government assumes a larger share of health care costs, it is increasingly able to use that as a justification to intrude into personal decisions or private enterprises, whether it's a matter of smoking policy, trans-fats, or salt," we wrote last month. Now the Wall Street Journal is out with an editorial praising Michelle Obama's campaign against childhood obesity, reasoning, "the reality is that U.S. obesity imposes huge costs on taxpayers. In 2006, the per capita increase in spending attributable to obesity was 36% for Medicare and 47% for Medicaid, according to a paper last year in Health Affairs. Many fat kids grow up to be fat adults, and you've got to start somewhere."
This is treacherous turf.
To a Skylark (1825)
ETHEREAL minstrel! pilgrim of the sky!
Dost thou despise the earth where cares abound?
Or, while the wings aspire, are heart and eye
Both with thy nest upon the dewy ground?
Thy nest which thou canst drop into at will,
Those quivering wings composed, that music still!
Leave to the nightingale her shady wood;
A privacy of glorious light is thine;
Whence thou dost pour upon the world a flood
Of harmony, with instinct more divine; 10
Type of the wise who soar, but never roam;
True to the kindred points of Heaven and Home!
Friday, February 12. 2010
Photo: Tenerife, Canary Islands
Mrs. BD and I have been engaged in a month-long debate about trips this year (in addition to the usual Cape Cod family reunion and, I think, hunting in Manitoba).
Cruise or car or trains? Scotland? Provence? Vienna and Prague? Venice and Veneto and the south Tyrol? Canary Islands and Madeira with stops in Morocco and Portugal? Turkey (I love that country)? Sailboat down the Turkish coast? Israel and Egypt?
Carpe diem, right? Now, or never. Could get hit by a bus tomorrow.
I am more in a Provence mood (or maybe Sicily again), but I always do love to get on a ship or a boat. It gives me a reason (besides tuitions) to work. (My theory of life? We can relax when we are dead.) Put it on the credit card...
Where do our readers want to go?
 Remembering Lincoln at Powerline.
I hate to correct Scott, but Lincoln was not the unanimous choice of the brand new Republican Party - he was the relatively-unknown compromise choice when a contentious convention could not agree on the front-runners - most of whom he put in his Cabinet.
Also interesting: Lincoln v. Obama or Liberty and Justice v. "Fairness" and Power
William Zinsser at American Scholar. A classic essay.
Now he has a new one: Writing English as a Second Language. One quote:
The English language is derived from two main sources. One is Latin, the florid language of ancient Rome. The other is Anglo-Saxon, the plain languages of England and northern Europe. The words derived from Latin are the enemy—they will strangle and suffocate everything you write. The Anglo-Saxon words will set you free.
How do those Latin words do their strangling and suffocating? In general they are long, pompous nouns that end in -ion—like implementation and maximization and communication (five syllables long!)—or that end in -ent—like development and fulfillment. Those nouns express a vague concept or an abstract idea, not a specific action that we can picture—somebody doing something. Here’s a typical sentence: “Prior to the implementation of the financial enhancement.” That means “Before we fixed our money problems.”
A Catholic Church is the only thing that saves a man from the degrading slavery of being a child of his age.
G.K. Chesterton (h/t, Anchoress)
Two assessments of the O:
Pajamas: Academically approved. A quote:
If only someone as gifted and righteous as The One were able to work freely on behalf of the common good, all would be well. After all, how could America go wrong pinning its destiny to a man that uses the word “elegant” and the phrase “academically approved” in the same sentence? You certainly weren’t going to get that from George Bush.
God save us from "academically-approved."
Noonan: The Off-center President. She asks "How did the president lose the room? How did he lose popularity?"
We think "global warming" is a political movement with quasi-religious overtones. Video via Moonbattery, who comments: "Is the global warming hoax a totalitarian plot? In a word: yes."
 Something has changed. Office romance is OK again.
The (loony) Lancet quietly corrects the record on autism
Bin Ladin's son thinks his Dad is a creep
What does "compromise" mean? Powerline
Obama-Care and Clinton's stent
Broder: Palin is pitch-perfect
Obama's Budget Would Redistribute $112 Billion From Top 1% of Taxpayers. Yes. That's the point.
At Kaus, the bit about the NYT and food stamps.
Iran has no respect for the O. They see him as a weak horse.
The O is changing his mind about raising taxes on the middle class. Nasty rant about the O at Blue Crab.
Via Surber:
“The fundamental understanding of the science of climate change, however, remains unchallenged and unchanged.”
Says who?
Thursday, February 11. 2010
If Amsterdam airport had a high-tech body scanner, the Christmas panty-crotch bomber wouldn’t have gotten on board. They’re in use at 19 US airports, so far. For those with privacy concerns about the explicit images they can produce, there is the option of a pat-down search.
Can you visualize the pat-down searches? Do you believe that a pat-down search would be as revealing of metal or non-metallic weapons, plastic or chemical explosives?
The Dutch are now using full-body scanners for US bound flights. “New software, however, eliminates that problem by projecting a stylized image onto a computer screen, highlighting the area of the body where objects are concealed in pockets or under the clothing and alerting security guards.”
Not to let science stand in the way of disarming security, the Figh Council of North America affiliate of the Islamic Society of North America and CAIR protesteth.
"It is a violation of clear Islamic teachings that men or women be seen naked by other men and women," FCNA explained. The group noted that Islam emphasizes modesty, considering it part of the faith. "The Qur'an has commanded the believers, both men and women, to cover their private parts" and to be modest in their dress.
While exceptions can be made in cases of "extreme necessity," FCNA indicated that passenger body scans do not rise to that level.
I wonder if using them for this purpose would rise to that level?
An Arab Ambassador in the United Arab Emirates is suing his wife for emotional and moral damage after he married her without seeing her face and discovered that she was cross-eyed and had a beard.
In The Examiner:
...Obama was faced with a fundamental choice. He could either chart a bipartisan course in response to the economic emergency, or he could try to expand government to Western European magnitude as Democratic congressional leaders, elected for years in monopartisan districts, had long wished to do.
The former community organizer and Chicago pol chose the latter course.
To the surprise of many who watched previous presidents present specific administration policies to Congress, he allowed Democratic leaders to design the stimulus package they rushed into law in six weeks.
One-third of the money went to state and local governments -- an obvious payoff to the public employee unions that contributed so much money to Democrats -- and much of it went to permanently increase the baseline spending of discretionary programs, a longtime goal of Democratic congressional leaders.
Who knew? The restoration of Elk to Kentucky has been a huge success. (Thanks, reader.) Now they need their hunting season, since the predators haven't found them yet. No Cougars or wolves seen in KY lately, alas. Wildcats, yes! A wonderful state, but too far from salt water for me.
There used to be forest-dwelling buffalo ("Bison" for purists) throughout Kentucky, Indiana, Missouri, Tennessee, Illinois, Ohio, too. How about trying a restoration of them? I do know that they bust through fences...
Is Greece too big to fail? I doubt it. Also, at Cato, let them go bankrupt.
They obviously need a fresh start. Like California.
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