Sunday, November 15. 2009
 Erl Happ, via Icecap:
What follows is a general theory of natural climate variation supported by observation of the changing temperature of the atmosphere and the sea between 1948 and September 2009. This work suggests that strong warming after 1978 is an entirely natural phenomenon.
“Mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun. The sun is much too sultry and one must avoid its ultry violet rays”. Noel Coward 1932.
Perhaps Noel Coward’s observation is particularly pertinent in the southern hemisphere where there is less ozone to absorb UVB. During the warming mode, protective ice crystals evaporate, allowing the surface to warm. Most of the warming activity post 1978 has been in the southern hemisphere in late winter and spring. This warming activity is plainly driven by shifts in atmospheric pressure affecting vortex activity. There are two climate modes:
The Warming Mode:
There is a shift of the atmosphere from the poles towards mid and low latitudes under electromagnetic forcing of ionized air.
Weakening of the polar vortexes curtails the flow of ionized nitrogen into the upper stratosphere allowing the survival of oxygen ions and increased ozone formation.
Intermixing of ozone into the upper troposphere raises temperature in the ice cloud zone. Ice crystals evaporate.
More solar radiation reaches the surface which warms.
In the southern hemisphere 200hpa temperature rises much more than in the northern hemisphere exhibiting strong equinoctial maxima.
Peak anomalies in stratospheric temperature occur in September-October rather than March.
A southern spring deficit in ice cloud density promotes warming across all southern latitudes which promotes the El Nino pattern of sea surface temperature at the equator.
The Cooling Mode
Surface atmospheric pressure increases at the poles as the electromagnetic force in the ionosphere/thermosphere relaxes. This happens at solar minimum as the quantum of ionizing radiation falls to its lowest levels. It also tends to happen at solar maximum as the suns magnetic polarity reverses and magnetic fields emanating from the sun tend to be self cancelling. The manifestation in the Pacific Ocean is La Nina cooling.
Strengthening of the polar vortexes introduces ionized nitrogen into the stratosphere reducing the population of oxygen ions and ozone.
A loss of ozone in the ice cloud zone reduces temperature enhancing the formation of reflective ice crystals.
Less solar radiation reaches the surface which cools.
A generally low ozone level in the stratosphere results in high amplitude change in stratospheric temperature during the ENSO cycle. This is expressed in high amplitude variation in 20hpa temperature at the equator. At the surface the swing from El Nino warming to La Nina cooling is more violent and extreme.
Change is more extreme in the southern hemisphere where the polar vortex is generally cooler especially at the highest altitudes. In the cool mode stratospheric temperature exhibits a March maximum probably in line with enhancement of orbital rather than geomagnetic influences on stratospheric temperature. The earth is closest to the sun in January.
A cooler stratosphere and upper troposphere in southern spring promotes ice cloud formation reducing the flux of solar radiation to the surface establishing a La Nina dominant regime in the Pacific Ocean.
The pattern of change from the cool to the warm mode and back again is well expressed in figure 22 showing the pattern of change of the (Darwin ?Tahiti) Southern Oscillation Index when compartmentalized according to solar cycle time intervals. A fall in this index represents warming. A dramatic fall in the index occurred about 1978. With the end of solar cycle 23 the globe is emerging from the strongest period of warming in the period of the instrumental record. The Southern Oscillation Index, based on barometric pressure, is not affected by the distortions present in the temperature record.
The smoking gun for natural climate variation is an increase in the temperature of the southern stratosphere and troposphere increasing with latitude all the way to the southern pole with a marked variation in southern hemisphere temperature in winter/spring between cool and warm episodes. This determines the strength of El Nino warming events across the tropics.
The smoking gun for greenhouse effects should be a generalized warming at all latitudes without any marked seasonal bias. If there were to be a seasonal bias it should be present as an increase in temperature above the norm when outgoing long wave radiation is maximal in the summer season. There should be no great difference between the hemispheres. That is far from what is actually observed. The evidence suggests that natural variation rather than anthropogenic influences drives climate change.
Continue reading "The real climate engine"
That's a question She Who Must Be Obeyed asked me. Well, here's one.
I do not think it's an issue that lots of people are fired up about. The chanting part is amusing. "Communism" - "Now!" Also, "What do we want?" - "Free stuff." "When do we want it?" - "Now!"
Best books on etiquette
Nyquist: Thucydides in the Underworld
How ed schools have destroyed American math skills
The teacher glut
Moon ice and spin ice
Spiro Agnew was right (h/t somebody)
Related: Time and Newsweek
The liberal Church of Medical Insurance
Krugman:
Washington is caught up in deficit phobia, and there doesn’t seem to be any chance of getting a big enough push.
That’s why, at this point, I’m turning to what I understand perfectly well to be a third-best solution: subsidizing jobs and promoting work-sharing.
Amazing: Times snarks Palin with statements that better apply to the O.
Peter Schiff:
"We're not going to solve the economic problems until we get rid of people like Chris Dodd. As long as Dodd is in there writing regulation, the economy is never going to recover, and more and more people are going to lose their jobs"
From Rick Moran's Why America needs a shrink:
Whither government in America, ask the people? How much should we allow it to do for us without losing something essential that makes us who we are? Are we really all that different of a people from everyone else on the planet? Is there an identifiable “American character” that sets us apart?
Our ancestors certainly thought so. Alexis de Tocqueville agreed. Indeed, it may be out of fashion to talk about the basis of our Constitution, but if we ever forget the idea that all power flows from the consent of the governed and not the other way around, we are doomed to suffer a significant loss of personal freedom simply because government can do pretty much whatever it chooses to do unless the people withhold their consent. There hasn’t been a lot of that these last 40 years and government’s ravenous appetite to do what all governments, once created, and regardless of who is in charge, seek to do - control - has gotten out of hand.
This despite the best of intentions of government’s major cheerleaders, and their belief that society can be perfected with the application of the principles of social science; seek out root causes of society’s problems and address them.
History began in 2009
Obamacare is looking iffy in the Senate
Mark 13:1-8
13:1 As he came out of the temple,
one of his disciples said to him, "Look, Teacher, what large stones and what
large buildings!"
13:2 Then Jesus asked him, "Do you see these great
buildings? Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown
down."
13:3 When he was sitting on the Mount of Olives opposite the
temple, Peter, James, John, and Andrew asked him privately,
13:4 "Tell
us, when will this be, and what will be the sign that all these things are about
to be accomplished?"
13:5 Then Jesus began to say to them, "Beware that
no one leads you astray.
13:6 Many will come in my name and say, 'I am
he!' and they will lead many astray.
13:7 When you hear of wars and
rumors of wars, do not be alarmed; this must take place, but the end is still to
come.
13:8 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against
kingdom; there will be earthquakes in various places; there will be famines.
This is but the beginning of the birthpangs.
Saturday, November 14. 2009
From Coyote:
Over the last year the Congress and Administration have:
- Printed trillions of dollars of new money, raising the risk of future inflation
- Borrowed trillions of dollars, sucking capital out of private lending markets
- Run up deficits that pretty much guarantee future tax increases
- Toyed with health care bills that will substantially increase the cost of labor
- Toyed with climate bills that will substantially increase the cost of fuel and electricity
- Demagogued industries with average to below-average profitability
for making obscene profits that must be reduced (e.g. health insurance
companies who make 3-4% of sales)
- Taken over whole industries (autos, banks) and run them to the
benefit of favored political constituencies, even when it violates the
law (e.g. trashing for secured creditors of auto companies in favor of
the UAW).
- Demonstrated a disdain for money-making by imposing populist
compensation limits on executives of out-of-favor companies and
industries.
- Spent money in the stimulus mainly to add government jobs, every
one of which is generally focused on making my life running a business
harder. If you do not understand or believe this, you have not run a
business that employs people.
- Shown a general philosophic hostility towards markets and capitalism
 An uplifting piece about freedom at American Thinker.
Even freedom of food is easy to lose and difficult to regain.
Lots of folks around the world like to eat McD's when they are hungry. I do not care for it much (I like Subway for on-the-road fast food if there is no local seafood or redneck joint in view), but what does what I like have to do with anything - except me?
I do not give a darn what other people eat. Food has become a fetish for some people. (For the French and the Italians, I will make excuses, however.)
If you were dismayed by those photos of the O not responding to the flag on Veteran's Day, (but had no problem with bowing - which is neither proper protocol nor American, to the Saudi Prince or, yesterday, to the Emperor of Japan - see Why is this man bowing?), then figure out these photos of the O in a Mao jacket from today or yesterday.
Good grief. Never thought I'd see the day that an American Pres would put on a Mao jacket. It sends a peculiar message. I would wear a tutu before I'd put on one of those - except maybe for Halloween.
(Re the bows, there was a time when gentlemen's bowing to eachother in America was a sign of respect, but it was replaced more than 100 years ago by the more dignified handshake. A bow is basically a symbol of submission.)
If somebody wants to run against the O, it would not be hard to put together a disturbing photo montage of a person who seems to respect any nation more highly than his own.
Neither Russia nor China, nor Iran, nor other hostile countries are comfortable with the dominance of world power held by the United States. They are independently and together working assiduously to neuter the US’ sway in the world. President Obama is helping them.
Russia is reasserting its influence over Eastern Europe, and over Western Europe via controlling its gas supplies. China is vigorously exercising mercantilist capitalism to rapidly build its economy and impoverish the West’s, locking up supplies of vital raw materials resources around the world, while racing ahead to build an ocean navy that includes aircraft carrier extensions of power throughout the globe. Iran is steadfast on attaining nuclear power and weaponry, which can reach Europe and will reach farther. Nuclear knowhow and development aid is shared with and by North Korea and Pakistan, purveyors to other countries. Venezuela, launch pad for subversion in Latin America, is to obtain nuclear assistance from Iran that will increase its sway and threat. Russia and China have used their veto seats on the UN Security Council to hamstring strong measures to slow or stop Iran’s imminent step into the nuclear power ring.
Arab states never really worried about Israel’s nuclear deterrence because Israel may be a convenient whipping boy but is not an aggressive power, so there was no need to build Arab nuclear counters. But, now, Arab states are seeing a need to build their own nuclear deterrence to Iran’s aggressive policies toward them. Nuclear proliferation within unstable nations that themselves may proliferate or where their technologies may fall into the hands of murderous extremists is spreading dangerously and rapidly. The ones to benefit are Russia, China and Iran, as the US’ deterrence is weakened and the US’ political and economic strength directly and relatively reduced.
Investors Daily lays out one scenario, a nuclear attack within the US: “For a superpower to be found so exposed to risk from a small group of fanatics might be too much to bear. And who would fill the vacuum? Which would become the new superpowers? Regimes that have proved unafraid to be ruthless to their own people, never mind their enemies?”
It need not even go that far. The Bush administration was not as stalwart as it could have been in facing these emerging new world orderers, but it tried. The Obama administration, by dangerous contrast, in its dithering, its weakened resolve to confront, its self-abandonment of deterrence and direct counters, is actually encouraging, in result aiding, the hastening of the new hostile, dangerous to the US, world order that will favor international thugs in Beijing, Moscow, Tehran, Pyongyang, Caracas, and a lengthening list of other capitals. Obama’s actions harming allies, while favoring or bowing before enemies, are part of this self-isolation, self-neuterization by the US within the world.
It is an interesting subject for debate whether this Obama self-defeat march comes from ideology or from incompetence or from ignorance, or their relative proportions. The consequences are the same: the neutering of the US, and possibly the day when one or more of our cities, and thus our economy, lays in ruins, topped by our bankruptcy from Obama economic policies and legislation.
Be afraid. Be very afraid. Be aware, and more determined than ever to slow and halt this self-destruction in the elections of 2010 and 2012. Start by demanding that potential Republican challengers are informed and resolute, and don’t ignore the saner Democrats. We’re all in this together.
Editor's comment: As Kudlow says, this is just one part of the administration's larger defeatist, declinist approach to everything: economics, trade, business, the military, international affairs, American values, American world leadership, etc. A deliberate attempt to downsize, if not damage, America. I think the O believes in himself - but not in us.
President Oba Mao heads to China. Do they still like Mao over there? If so, why? I thought they had evolved past authoritarian hero-worship.
Photo below via Flopping, who provides the quote:
Hey, Obama has just nationalized nothing more and nothing less than General
Motors. Comrade Obama! Fidel, careful or we are going to end up to his
right,”
- Venezuelan “president” Hugo
Chavez
 CUNY students can't do math. You would think the SAT would have made that clear.
Newt Gingrich: The job-killing president and Congress
Climate change bill to back burner. I think it's dead. Or frozen.
Jesus the Capitalist? I do not think that He spent a lot of time on politics. His agenda had to do with higher matters. I did learn the word eisegesis from the article.
I Really Need To Stop Watching The Main Stream Media Because My Face Will Freeze Like This h/t, Riehl
England gone mad: Jail time for turning in gun to cops
Thompson: Careful, dear readers. That’s the white heat of insight.
Why Compel Young Adults to Buy Health Insurance They Don't Need and Don't Want?
The Audacity of Extremism:
The Audacity of Obama is a
front, and it's starting to crumble. America's endurance is in our
people, the tens of millions who remember our history -- not the phony
history that the vulgar Marxists are now peddling all over the schools.
The conservative media are beginning to seize the national narrative
again. All we need to do is to tell the truth over and over, every
single chance we get.
Andy McCarthy via Michelle on the notion of giving Khalid Sheik Mohammed a civilian trial:
We are now going to have a trial that never had to happen for
defendants who have no defense. And when defendants have no defense for
their own actions, there is only one thing for their lawyers to do: put
the government on trial in hopes of getting the jury (and the media)
spun up over government errors, abuses and incompetence. That is what
is going to happen in the trial of KSM et al. It will be a soapbox for
al-Qaeda’s case against America. Since that will be their “defense,”
the defendants will demand every bit of information they can get about
interrogations, renditions, secret prisons, undercover operations
targeting Muslims and mosques, etc., and — depending on what judge
catches the case — they are likely to be given a lot of it. The
administration will be able to claim that the judge, not the
administration, is responsible for the exposure of our defense secrets.
And the circus will be played out for all to see — in the middle of the
war. It will provide endless fodder for the transnational Left to press
its case that actions taken in America’s defense are violations of
international law that must be addressed by foreign courts. And the
intelligence bounty will make our enemies more efficient at killing us.
Related, as Dino says, "As the man said, it really is impossible to caricature this administration." (That's from a cool site which is new to us: Baseball Crank)
 When you sit in the blind awaiting the flight
of the white-breasted northern sprig,
while they circle high and think to light,
and they look so close and big,
you whisper your pard, and you both crouch low,
"Now - don't wait too long!"
You shoot - too far - and off they go.
Whatever you do is wrong!
Then you curse yourself for a fool greenhorn,
your pride has had a blow:
sullen you sit and smoke and mourn
when in comes a bunch - fair low!
You watch them circle round and round
"Just let them work along!"
When off they swing, southward bound.
Whatever you do is wrong.
And so, through life, a poor wretch tries
to do what he thinks is right,
to place his funds so that when he dies
his family'll be sitting tight;
to raise the young with the best in mind
and sometimes it works like a song,
but often he finds like the man in the blind,
whatever you do is wrong.
Still I think that God who sits in His sky
and watches each man in his blind,
when it comes time for the hunter to die,
surely He'll keep in mind
that each one tried to do what he ought,
and He'll put us where we belong;
for He'll understand that fellow who thought
whatever he did was wrong.
Author unknown, as far as I know.
Image: Wood Ducks by Peter Maas
Friday, November 13. 2009
Government planning, via Marginal:
China's empty city
(of the day). YouTube. At about 1:20 you will see that a city built
for one million residents remains empty, a' la Austro-Chinese business
cycle theory. "Ordos was a government idea, an infrastructure project
taken to its limits, the motivation was likely gdp..." -- can you
get better than that? After the first minute or so the video
is stunning.
From The American, seven interesting, inexpensive market-based sorts of medical services that are in operation today. Some good tips in there, including the $4 prescriptions.
From Legal Insurrection, via Tiger: 100% Plus Taxation Key To Permanent Dem Majority.
One quote:
To say that antipoverty programs in the United States are perverted may
be an understatement. When you take into account the loss of
means-tested benefits (e.g., cash assistance, food stamps, housing
subsidies, and health insurance), and the taxes that people pay on
earned income, the return to working is essentially zero for those in
the lower two quintiles of the income distribution.
For many of
the working poor, the implicit marginal tax rate is greater than 100
percent. The long-run consequence of undermining the positive incentive
to work is, of course, the creation of an underclass acclimated to not
working...
Those photos of White Moose that have been going around for a couple of years are legit. Not albinos though: Just White Moose.
How you can tell when a guy doesn't feel all that good about his country. This is becoming a pattern. (h/t Gateway)
At Pajamas. People don't want this.
 One of the best new features in Vista (it's also in Windows 7) is the Snipping Tool. I only started using Vista a month ago, so it took me a while to blunder my way across it. What a great find.
If you just want a grab a picture from the Web for your own use, you right-click on it and save it. The problem arises when you just want part of a picture, or part of a web page (or program) that's not a picture. The traditional method is to hit the 'Print Scrn' key on the keyboard, which puts a snapshot of the entire screen into memory, then paste it into a paint program and do your cropping. The Snipping Tool eliminates the entire process.
In Vista's Start Menu, the entry is in Programs/Accessories. In Win7, it'll either be on the main Start Menu list or buried somewhere. If you don't see the entry, open Control Panel, 'Programs and Features', click on 'Turn Windows features on and off' over to the left, then checkmark the "Tablet PC" entry and let it load. If it's already checked and you swear you can't find the entry on the Start Menu, uncheck 'Tablet', reboot, then put it back in. (Why it's tied in with the tablet's features is anybody's guess.)
Update: A commenter noted that the 'Tablet' feature isn't offered in his 'Home' edition, so if you don't see a 'Tablet PC' entry in the 'Features' box, check out the couple of free snipping tools available here.
To use Snipping Tool, just fire it up. It automatically goes straight into 'capture mode'. Grab the mouse, hold down the left button and d-r-a-g it over the area you want to snip. When you let go, a box pops open with the sniplet. Do a 'Save As' and there ya go.
There are a couple of other features in the sniplet box you might find useful, such as a 'pen' tool where you can manually write words or circle something, and a yellow 'highlight' tool. If you don't like what you circled or highlighted, click on the 'Eraser' tool and then the area you want erased. You can also send the snip directly to someone via email without even bothering to save it, another time-saver.
There are a couple of Options you might want to change:
— You can add it to the Quick Launch tool bar if you use it.
— The 'ink' color is the color of the border it puts around the snip, so you might prefer black or some dark color over the default red.
Kudos to Microsoft for an excellent time-saving tool that works perfectly.
From Ace's excellent (and serious) essay Pelosi: It's Very Fair That We Jail You If You Don't Buy Health Insurance:
I'm paranoid? Really? I am not fretting here about some remote and
unlikely possibility. We are not speaking here of "slippery slopes" or
in terms of "what comes next?"
We are instead objecting to a black-letter law spelled out for all to see in the very first piece of legislation you're proposing.
Right out of the box. The state here -- Pelosi, Reid, Obama -- are
claiming that they can imprison people for behavior that has never
before even been hinted as being a crime, on the theory that such
behavior constitutes unpatriotic economic behavior which is detrimental to the state's balance sheets.
Think about what a broad, all-encompassing term "economics" is. 80%
of our waking hours are spent in economic activity of one sort or
another. The state here is asserting the right to imprison people
for behavior they consider not actually morally reprehensible or
harmful as other crimes are, but instead merely detrimental to the
Great Push Forward, the state's master plan of economic health and
well-being.
Right out of the box they propose sending people to jail for acting as economic subversives and economic traitors and yet I am, somehow, paranoid if I point out that the first step here is to reduce human freedom and increase state power. And this is just a down-payment, remember. This is merely the first
of many freedoms you previously believed sacrosanct to be lost.
Read the whole thing.
 Photos from Cassini (as is this photo)
For history buffs, two books via Theo:
Greek And Roman Artillery, Technical Treaties
E. W. Marsden
And
Greek and Roman Artillery. Historical Development
E. W. Marsden
FBI seizes mosques in NYC
Prayer is ruining me for blogging. Anchoress. Prayer, as I have come to understand it, is a conversation with God. That is indeed more precious than writing.
A harmless moonbat, for once.
Would government medical care cover "perfect vaginas"?
More on SEIU: A civil war
Sullivan is always an easy target. Dithering is good. Not in a battle, Andrew.
Speaking of dithering, here's a Mom who did not dither.
How politically divided is America? Very. Not a bad thing.
Putting the brakes on hysteria. Lowry:
Supporters of Obamacare have their next
target for obloquy and shame. It’s the United States Senate, an
institution whose villainy will almost match that of the insurers and
Fox News if the health-care bill sinks there.
The
anti-senatorial campaign is already revving up. Liberal columnist
Harold Meyerson stamped his feet in frustration yesterday in the Washington Post at the cussed balkiness of the Senate: “Dithering Heights.” “Proceeds glacially and produces next to nothing.”
This amounts to raging at the Senate for its very nature and purpose. It’s supposed
to be slow-paced and unproductive. Everyone has their moments of
frustration at the Senate (I’ve had plenty) because it is designed to
be frustrating, especially when a majority in the House is electric
with ideological excitement. Conservatives spent most of 1995 hurling
epithets at the Senate.
So it’s not surprising that the Left
is upset at it at a time when “Iron Nancy” is using her solid majority
to muscle massive pieces of legislation through the House by a handful
of votes. Why can’t the Senate do the same, goes the
cry, entirely missing the point. It’s not just that the Senate is built
differently from the House: It won’t truly be fulfilling its role in
our constitutional scheme if doesn’t deep-six Obamacare.
We have asked our friend Capt. Tom Francis to share some photos and info about his home town of Woodstock, CT. (Maybe in April we'll invite him to write about trout fishing in New England, as he is a fresh and salt-water fishing guide.)
Here's his first offering -
Roseland Cottage.
Built by Henry Chandler Bowen in 1846 - a local resident who made his fortune in New York City - Roseland Cottage, also known as "The Pink House", is located in Woodstock, CT. Designed by Andrew Jackson Dowling whose design concepts stressed the practical as well as the aesthetic. It's exterior design is called Gothic Revival. I wouldn't know Gothic Revival from Greasy Gravy, but that's what I've been told.
Roseland Cottage also has original Lincrusta wall coverings produced by Fredrick Walton of Walton Linoleum fame. The Lincrusta process produces embossed coverings made from linseed oil and wood flour on linen.
Bowen was an ardent abolitionist, Congregationalist, and Republican. He often entertained many of the heavy hitters of the day including Presidents - most notably President U.S. Grant who was enchanted by the in-home bowling alley. Bowen was known for his philanthropy and he had a huge impact on Woodstock and local towns. More on Bowen later in the series.
Thursday, November 12. 2009
From a pointed Graham post at NRO, we learn that
UMass (also) has a speech code, by the way (it bans, among other things, "staring or leering"), so figure that one out.
Leer at will, my Yankee friends, below the fold, and indulge in a little healthy Thoreauvian civil disobedience -
Continue reading "Leer at will - only for UMass students (and faculty)"
While lesbian feminista Democrat Camille Paglia admires Pelosi's "grittiness" and "mettle" (but detests what Pelosi has produced. BTW, we like Paglia a lot. She is the kind of person it is pleasant and interesting to disagree with, and we appreciate grit in women), Dr. Laura has another view of the world at home: The Evolution of ‘Feminism' Saddens Me. One quote:
...it’s pretty easy to make men happy.
It is remarkable that each and every one of the women who has
called my show complaining about her husband, and who was then asked
the question, "Would you want to come home to you?" has said,
haltingly, no. There it is. When women disdain masculinity and their
own femininity, all is lost for the family.
These sorts of discussions, however interesting at times, are a bit off the point. Men need to be gentle sometimes, and women need to be tough sometimes. Both obviously have these capacities. However, I think that if a woman wants to have a happy marriage she would do well to at least give Dr. Laura a listen. She understands men pretty well, and likes them for what they are.
This morning I told a friend I often watch idiotic escapist movies. Those who make the better ones need to be creative wonders. A look behind the scenes at one of the more successful reveals that he needs also to be an idiot.
My local newspaper carries a wire service profile of the director of the upcoming $200-million special effects movie “2012.” This director, Roland Emmerich, from Germany, “has earned the unofficial title of ‘Master of Disaster’” for his prior hits, “Independence Day” (1996), “Godzilla” (1998), and “The Day After Tomorrow.” (2004) They were, indeed, fairly good idiotic escapist movies, to me.
His soon to be released topper will have “a collapse of the Earth’s crust, giant floods and hellish rains of fire (yet not enough to kill the main character, played by John Cusak).”
Wow! Can hardly wait. New York destroyed again. Been there, done that, you say.
Emmerich does more, but notice what he doesn’t do: "In fact, the man who rose to fame as a cinematic escapist is an activist in real life. In Germany, he’s a strong supporter of the environmentalist Green Party. He campaigns for gay rights, and he doesn’t hide his contempt for organized religion.” OK, he does fit in with Hollywood.
As the profile continues: “In 2012, the pope is buried under debris when St. Peter’s dome comes tumbling down, and peace-loving Tibetan monks are not spared by the great floods. No Islamic site is seen perishing, though. ‘We didn’t destroy Mecca because we didn’t want to have to deal with a fatwa,’ Emmerich says.” OK, he does fit in with the PCers who made the Ft. Hood massacre possible and the media community apologists for poor, misunderstood, stressed Hasan. Can’t wait for that Hollywood film version, huh? What courage it takes to trash Western civilization, and make the world safe for its destroyers!
Emmerich puts the idiot cherry on his half-baked cake of a mind with this one, why he “couldn’t make a patriotic feel-good movie like ‘Independence Day’ anymore: ‘These days I have a much more pessimistic outlook for our civilization, despite the good America can do for the world under Barack Obama.” OK, we’re waiting for his film about how Obama’s abandonment of oppressed peoples in Tibet, in Iran, in Honduras, in the growing list to include Afghanistan and maybe Iraq, will cheer shmuck Emmerich up. (Couldn’t resist the alliteration.)
BTW, I’d love to give you, dear reader, the url to see this profile in idiocy for yourself. But, due to the past triumphs of idiocy in media my local newspaper’s falling circulation cannot afford to pay extra anymore for the wire service reports in its dead-tree edition to also appear at its website, and the MCT wire service website – unlike AP's, even – doesn’t even steer the reader to a newspaper that does.
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