Eco-hypocrite of the day: movie director James Cameron

PREVIOUSLY on eco-hypocrisy:
•Eco-hypocrisy: Supermodel Gisele and Prince Charles
•Barack Obama
•Nancy Pelosi
•The ever-increasing energy use of Al Gore's mansion
•With five private jets, Travolta still lectures on global warming

Robbie the robot on patrol in Nevada; Also was Biden right?

As a reminder that we are now living in the 21st century, General Dynamics has developed a robot that patrols the roads and confronts intruders. It is currently operational at the Nevada National Security Site:

On the subject of advanced technology, Vice President Joe Biden recently said:

“Every single great idea that has marked the 21st century, the 20th century and the 19th century has required government vision and government incentive,”

He is, of course, wrong (he said "every") but not as wrong as his critics claim. For example, at reason.com, Matt Welch proposes as counter-examples:

How about the personal computer? The mobile phone?

However, both of those technologies involved both government and private industry. The underlying technology for both is semiconductor electronics which started with the transistor which was invented by a government-sanctioned monopoly: Bell Telephone. After that, semiconductor electronics were further developed to practical use by various companies under funding from DoD and NASA. Taking a longer view, mobile phones, for example, were widely used by soldiers in World War II decades before they were in common use by civilians. The reason is that, for the military, communications are a critical life-and-death matter and therefore worthy of investment over a long period. Long term planning has similarly characterized DoD investment in aircraft and space. For private companies, by contrast, a long term plan is likely to be closer to 2 to 5 years rather than 20 to 50 years that the DoD is comfortable with. Consequently, the government, principally through the military, has had a strong role in the development of new technologies.

On the other hand, Matt Welch is right that PCs and cell phones would never have become affordable for the average citizen without competitive private industry. What happens when there is no private industry is made clear by the example of the Soviet Union where the government did fund a lot of successful research but few consumer products ever resulted. Going back further in history, imperial China invented a lot of new technologies, like the mechanical clock, the compass, and gunpowder, but these technologies reached their potential in only countries not under the totalitarian control of an emperor. Private companies play a role that the government is simply unable to.

Obama's rhetoric sinks still lower

Pres. Obama's campaign rhetoric has become increasingly inflammatory and even racial:

• Obama: "We don't mind the Republicans joining us. They can come for the ride, but they gotta sit in back."
  


• Obama: “If Latinos sit out the election instead of saying, ‘We’re gonna punish our enemies and we’re gonna reward our friends who stand with us on issues that are important to us,’ if they don’t see that kind of upsurge in voting in this election, then I think it’s gonna be harder and that’s why I think it’s so important that people focus on voting on November 2.”

Hat tip: Instapundit, Ed Driscoll, and JamieWearingFool.

It seems that, when he ascended into the oval office, Obama just expected everyone in the country to realize that progressivism was the one true answer. When that didn't happen, he had no Plan B.

PREVIOUSLY on related subjects:
•Obama's violent rhetoric
•Obama and the coarsening of American culture
•Creeping fascism

How to lie with statistics

Keith Hennessey explains (hat tip: Mankiw) how misleading an economic chart can be using, as an example, a chart from the Obama administration:

PREVIOUSLY on Obamanomics:
•Obamacare: Corporatism in action
•Obama 0, Germany 1:
• Medical insurance prices rising due to ObamaCare
•Laws of Economics 1; Obama 0
•Why Liberal economics fails: redistribution does not create wealth (Illustrated)
•Obamacare endangers student health
•Why business isn't hiring
•Dodd-Frank finance "reform" bill stops bond market cold
•Why unemployment insurance must be extended (illustrated)
•Obamanomics still failing, Washington Post discovers
•Russia goes supply-side
•Study: Liberals are economically illiterate

The bombshell that wasn't

At ABC News, the reporters, assisted no doubt by their layers of editors and fact-checkers, seemed to be a bit over-eager in their pursuit of higher Iraqi casualties. Thomas Jocelyn, of the Weekly Standard, writes:

Early Friday evening I received a link, via email, to this story at ABC News’s website by Russell Goldman and Luis Martinez. The opening sentences read (emphasis added): 

In what is being described as the largest release of secret U.S. military documents ever, whistle-blowing web site WikiLeaks has published a trove of classified reports about the war in Iraq, including a secret U.S. government tally that put the Iraqi death toll at 285,000, according to news sources that received advanced copies of the documents.

A little while later I clicked on the link again, but now the opening sentences had been changed to read (emphasis added): 

In what is being described as the largest release of secret U.S. military documents ever, the whistle-blowing web site WikiLeaks has released a trove of classified reports about the war in Iraq, including a secret U.S. government tally that puts the Iraqi death toll between 109,000 and 285,000, according to news sources that received advanced copies of the documents.

And then a little later again (emphasis added):

The whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks today released a trove of classified reports about the war in Iraq that it said documented at least 109,000 deaths in the war, a higher number than the United States previously has acknowledged, as well as what it described as cases of torture and other abuses by Iraqi and coalition forces.

This strikes me as indicative of the media’s overall reporting on the Iraq War. Media outlets initially jumped on the claim that WikiLeaks had released a previously secret study showing that 285,000 Iraqis had perished in Iraq. ABC News hadn’t even seen the study at the time of its initial report. Instead, it summarized other “news sources” that reportedly had. . . .

As can be seen in the third, and hopefully last, version of the ABC News account, the WikiLeaks documents purportedly show that “at least 109,000” were killed in the Iraq War. That’s the number currently on display at the WikiLeaks website. It is not that far off from the statistic compiled by the website Iraq Body Count, which pegs the total number of fatalities at over 107,000.

What is Obama's real agenda?

Hat tip: GunSlinger.

PREVIOUSLY on Pres. Obama's economic agenda:
•Obamacare: Corporatism in action
•Obama 0, Germany 1:
• Medical insurance prices rising due to ObamaCare
•Laws of Economics 1; Obama 0
•Why Liberal economics fails: redistribution does not create wealth (Illustrated)
•Obamacare endangers student health
•Why business isn't hiring
•Dodd-Frank finance "reform" bill stops bond market cold
•Why unemployment insurance must be extended (illustrated)
•Obamanomics still failing, Washington Post discovers
•Russia goes supply-side
•Study: Liberals are economically illiterate

Creeping fascism

Two items:

1. After reviewing the role of MediaMatters in the firing of Juan Williams from NPR, Prof. Jacobson observes (hat tip: Instapundit):
   

   No conservatives are trying to prevent people from appearing on NPR, but liberal interest groups and their media outlets are trying to prevent people from appearing on Fox News.
   
   There is a real threat to freedom in this country, and it does not come from conservatives. Media Matters is just the symptom, not the disease. [Emph. added]



2. After reviewing Justice Department misbehavior in the New Black Panther case, John Hinderaker observes:
   

   It would be interesting to poll that question. How many Americans do you suppose think it is OK for an American to have to squeeze past billy club-wielding thugs in order to cast a ballot? Outside the Obama administration, I would guess the answer is close to zero. There is an interesting parallel to card-check, the Union Thug Empowerment Act. The Obama administration also thinks it is a great idea to abolish the secret ballot in union elections, so that thugs can threaten unwilling workers and coerce them into voting for the union. The Obama administration embraces not only the ends, but also the means of national socialism. [Emph. added]

PREVIOUSLY:
•Obama's violent rhetoric
•Obamacare: Corporatism in action
•Obama sells out free speech
•Physicians' group to sue Obama administration over suppression of dissent

Tammy Bruce exposes the myth of liberal "tolerance"

Tammy Bruce, former president of the Los Angeles chapter of NOW, was a long time liberal. Now, she is an openly lesbian Tea Party supporter. Writing in the UK Guardian, Tammy Bruce explains what it is like to be "out, proud, and conservative":

I was asked: what is it like to be gay and conservative?

After all, those conservatives hate the homos, don't they? It must be very, very difficult for me, one concerned reader noted, to be among the intolerant and hateful. . . .

The real story of bigotry and intolerance is the fact that it lives and thrives on the left. As a gay woman who spent most of her adult life pushing the cart for liberal causes with liberal friends in a liberal city, I found that sexism, racism and homophobia are staples in the liberal world. The huge irony is liberals spend every ounce of energy promoting the notion that they are the banner carriers of individualism and personal freedom, yet the hammer comes down on anyone who dares not to conform to, or who dissents even in part from, the liberal agenda.

Think about what would happen if you did act up? If you dared to say you like Sarah Palin, or admire Margaret Thatcher, or think global warming is a hoax, or think Bill Clinton is a sexual predator, or that George W Bush isn't to blame for everything, or that Barack Obama has absolutely no clue what he's doing, you know there would be a price to pay. Odds are that your "liberal" friends would very liberally hate you. [Emph. added]

PREVIOUSLY on the ways in which liberals lie to themselves:
•The New York Times and the art of self-deception
•Lie to me
•Lying as a political strategy
•Lies that feel good
•Environmentalists more likely to cheat: being a liberal means not having to follow the rules
•Once I have my opinion, I'll tell you what the facts are
• AFP photo deception?
•In South Korea, liberal dreamers meet reality

NPR allies itself with George Soros

NPR's always tenuous claim to be a centrist news outlet should come to end with this Fox News report:

[B]illionaire liberal icon George Soros has donated $1.8 million to hire 100 new reporters for 50 of its member stations.

Republican Party Fail, II

The top Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, Sen. Judd Gregg (RINO-NH), does not want to de-fund or repeal Obamacare. The Hill reports:

"I don't think starving or repealing is probably the best approach here," Gregg said on the Fox Business Network. "You basically go in and restructure it."

That's a change of pace even for Gregg, who's been among almost all fellow Republicans in the House and Senate who've called for the repeal of the measure, which Democrats passed through Congress earlier this year and President Obama signed into law.

"Our view is, you repeal and replace this bill," Gregg said on CNN in March. "You replace it with better law and better approaches towards healthcare."

On the one hand, he does seem to understand that Obamacare is a bad law. On the other hand, the populace is the middle of an historic revolt against big government. Even Democrats, when they fear losing in 2010, talk about repealing Obamacare. Yet, Sen. Gregg seems to have missed the spirit of all that and is talking like it is business-as-usual-in-DC. It is good that he is retiring from the Senate at the end of the year.

Video of Sen. Gregg's interview is here.

PREVIOUSLY on the subject of ObamaCare:
•Obamacare forcing Boeing to cut back employee healthcare coverage
•Special privileges: McDonald's and 29 other companies get waivers from Obamacare
•Obamacare threatens health coverage for fast-food workers
•ObamaCare threatens child-only insurance
•Medical insurance prices rising due to ObamaCare
•Obamacare endangers student health
•Obama's health care and economic policies explained
•Obamacare may raise insurance costs by 54%
•Harvard economist explains why Obamacare will raise premiums
•HHS says Obamacare will cause costs to go up and cause employers to drop coverage

Obamacare forcing Boeing to cut back employee coverage

Boeing Aerospace provides its employees with good medical insurance coverage.  That is cause for the Federal government to punish Boeing with a 40% tax on the value of the plan above the $10,200 per person limit (or $27,000 per family limit) set by Obamacare law.  To reduce the value below that threshold, AP reports that Boeing will increase the deductibles and copayments that its employees must pay:

Deductibles, the share of medical costs that [Boeing] employees pay annually before their plan kicks in, will go up to $300 for individuals, an increase of $100. For families, the new deductible will be $900, an increase of $300.

In addition, Boeing is instituting a copayment of 10 percent after the deductible has been met. The copayment will rise to 20 percent in 2012.

The authors of Obamacare thought that their 40% excise tax would raise the revenue that they needed to fund other provisions.  If other companies behave as Boeing plans to, and it is rational for them to do so, the tax will likely raise little to no revenue.  Even before the law is fully in effect, we have yet another Obamacare fail.

PREVIOUSLY on the subject of ObamaCare:
•Special privileges: McDonald's and 29 other companies get waivers from Obamacare
•Obamacare threatens health coverage for fast-food workers
•ObamaCare threatens child-only insurance
•Medical insurance prices rising due to ObamaCare
•Obamacare endangers student health
•Obama's health care and economic policies explained
•Obamacare may raise insurance costs by 54%
•Harvard economist explains why Obamacare will raise premiums
•HHS says Obamacare will cause costs to go up and cause employers to drop coverage

Republican Party Fail

In Monday's Wall Street Journal, Fred Barnes writes on the failure this year of the Republican National Committee (RNC), headed by Michael Steele, to fund the traditional get-out-the-vote (GOTV) efforts. For example:

In Ohio, state chairman Kevin DeWine is desperate for RNC support. The state party was promised $1.1 million from the committee but has received only $566,900. And that, Mr. DeWine said in a letter to Mr. Steele last week, "simply pales in comparison to the investment of the previous three cycles." In 2006, the RNC gave nearly $5 million to the Ohio party. . . .

In past elections, the RNC has provided major financial help to House and Senate campaigns. In 2006, it transferred $25 million each to the NRCC and its Senate counterpart. This cycle, it sent $2 million apiece to the two committees in early 2009 but nothing since.

The reason is that Michael Steele has failed to raise the money needed:

Since Mr. Steele was elected chairman last year, the RNC has raised almost $153.7 million, roughly $90 million less than in 2006. It has aired only a few TV ads and its get-out-the-vote (GOTV) drive is considerably less ambitious than in previous midterm elections. [Emph. added]

It is not all bad. The slack is being picked up by independent groups, such as Americans for Prosperity, who likely have a better idea of what voters want than the Republican party's Washington bureaucracy ever did.

Cultures rising and falling

In India, they are contemplating how to raise cultural standards as the legacy of its old 3rd world culture collides with the new India's modern ambitions. The LA Times reports:

The international embarrassment that India suffered in the run-up to the Commonwealth Games — marred by massive cost overruns, a collapsed bridge and widespread corruption allegations — has focused attention on a stubborn cultural condition that if not checked, analysts here say, could undercut India's superpower ambitions.

An attitude referred to in Hindi as "chalta hai," which translates to "it goes" but can mean "don't be bothered," "whatever," "it'll do," or "don't fret (such problems as corruption, delays, shoddy quality)." . . . .

As the hangover sets in, however, some wonder why it took prime ministerial intercession to get toilets cleaned in the athletes village, why Indian planning compared so poorly with neighboring China's hosting of the 2008 Summer Olympics and whether a wing-it attitude befits a nation with such talent, potential and prospects.

"It doesn't matter if we're a growing superpower or the stock market's at record levels," said Vinod Mehta, editor in chief of the Outlook media group. "What these Games showed is that we've hit the limit on chalta hai."

While India plots self-improvement, Pres. Obama presides over the continued coarsening of American culture. As a consequence of Obama's exceptionally political State of the Union address last year in which he dishonestly attacked the Supreme Court, Justice Alito has decided to break tradition and not attend next year's SotU speech. This follows two years of increasingly violent from Pres. Obama in which he calls on his supporters to "get in [his critics'] faces," "hit back twice as hard," and even "bring a gun." It would be one thing if his supporters regarded the rhetoric as metaphorical but they don't. Yesterday morning, for example, reporter William Kelly swore "a warrant for CBS reporter Jay Levine's arrest" (hat tip: Instapundit) after Levine threatened to "deck" him for asking tough questions of Obama ally and current Chicago Mayoral candidate Rahm Emmanuel. Video of the assault is here.

2012 cannot come soon enough.

Your tax dollars at work

Inside Higher Ed reports:

Michigan's Department of Human Services has heard enough rumors that college students are abusing its equivalent of a food stamp program that it has deemed the idea "Myth No. 5" on its list of welfare program myths. But the Lansing State Journal, in an article published Thursday, quotes numerous store clerks complaining that local college students are using their "Bridge Cards" -- which are supposed to be used only for essentials -- on mixes for liquor and junk food.

State officials say that as many as 18,000 college and university students are receiving food assistance at any point in time. Some myth.

PREVIOUSLY on how the government spends your tax dollars:
•Your tax dollars at work — at strip clubs
•California pension funds face huge losses, money spent on luxury trips and gifts
•TARP program: 20 preliminary and full criminal investigations initiated
•NY school administrators buy $3,000 bookcases, claim state rules require overspending
•Californian farmers to resell state-subidized water at a profit

Obama lied; the environment died

Environmentalists are furious that Government Motors lied about the Chevy Volt.  Jalopnik writes:

In the past, and based on GM's claims, we've gone so far as to call the Volt GM's "Jesus Car." And why wouldn't we call it that? We were told the Volt would achieve 230 MPG fuel economy and would always use the electric drivetrain to motivate the wheels — only using the onboard gasoline engine as a "range extender" for charging the batteries. It now turns out that not only were those fuel economy claims misleading, but the gasoline engine is actually used to motivate the wheels — making the Volt potentially nothing more than a very advanced hybrid car and pushing some automotive journalists like Scott Oldham at Edmunds.com to claim "GM lied to the world" about it.

Curiously, you can read the entire article and not find one mention that those liars at GM are working for Pres. Obama.

More politicized science

Two examples:

1. The AP reports on the Obama administration's politicization of oil spill science:

   The Obama administration blocked efforts by government scientists to tell the public just how bad the Gulf oil spill could become and committed other missteps that raised questions about its competence and candor during the crisis, according to a commission appointed by the president to investigate the disaster. [Emph. added]
   

2. The San Francisco Chronicle reports on the erroneous science used by California's Air Resources Board to justify more government regulation:

   California grossly miscalculated pollution levels in a scientific analysis used to toughen the state's clean-air standards, and scientists have spent the past several months revising data and planning a significant weakening of the landmark regulation, The Chronicle has found. . . .

   Mary Nichols, chairwoman of the California Air Resources Board, offered no explanation when The Chronicle questioned her about the diesel emissions miscalculation.

   Hat tip: Instapundit and Uncoverage.

PREVIOUSLY on politicized science:
•AIDS advocates distorted science
•Politicized science of crime statistics
•Politicization of medical science
•Bee colony collapse disorder: the cause is whatever your politics say it is
•Ozone hole and politics

US Postal Union Election Delayed After Ballots Lost in the US Mail

The government is beyond parody. Fox News reports:
Soon, thanks to Pres. Obama, your medical care will be delivered with the same efficiency and reliability.

Obama's violent rhetoric

As collected by Jim Hoft at GatewayPundit:

• Obama: “They Bring a Knife…We Bring a Gun”
• Obama to His Followers: “Get in Their Faces!”
  
• Obama on ACORN Mobs: “I don’t want to quell anger. I think people are right to be angry! I’m angry!”
  
• Obama to His Mercenary Army: “Hit Back Twice As Hard”
  
• Obama on the private sector: “We talk to these folks… so I know whose ass to kick.“
• Obama says a Republican majority in Congress would mean “hand-to-hand combat” on Capitol Hill for the next two years

PREVIOUSLY on the related subject of the left and violence:
•Peace protester confesses to murder
•Three peace protesters arrested for 3rd degree assault
•Round-up of left-wing terrorism
•Yet another left-wing terrorist
•Obama's humane plan for terrorists: kill rather than interrogate
•Before Al Qaeda: the socialist-terrorist alliance of the 1980s
•Peace activists turn violent
•Reuters thinks that terrorists are opposed to violence

Obamacare: Corporatism in action

In free enterprise, companies compete to sell their products to customers. Under corporatism (sometimes called national socialism), by contrast, companies compete for government favors that give them a privileged position over competitors. In light of that, read about Obamacare (from Bloomberg News Service):

Thirty companies and organizations, including McDonald's (MCD) and Jack in the Box (JACK), won't be required to raise the minimum annual benefit included in low-cost health plans, which are often used to cover part-time or low-wage employees.

The Department of Health and Human Services, which provided a list of exemptions, said it granted waivers in late September so workers with such plans wouldn't lose coverage from employers who might choose instead to drop health insurance altogether.

Via these waivers, these thirty companies are now have advantages that their competitors don't. In the future, if you were to plan to open a business to compete with them, remember that you are no longer competing on the better product at a better price so much as you are on the the political connections needed to let you make that product at that price.

PREVIOUSLY on Obamanomics:
•Obama 0, Germany 1:
• Medical insurance prices rising due to ObamaCare
•Laws of Economics 1; Obama 0
•Why Liberal economics fails: redistribution does not create wealth (Illustrated)
•Obamacare endangers student health
•Why business isn't hiring
•Dodd-Frank finance "reform" bill stops bond market cold
•Why unemployment insurance must be extended (illustrated)
•Obamanomics still failing, Washington Post discovers
•Russia goes supply-side
•Study: Liberals are economically illiterate

Obama and his failure to communicate

At the (left-wing) Crooks and liars blog, there is a discussion of communication "essentials" for national socialist dictators:

Raymond Gram Swing was a News commentator for the Mutual Broadcasting System network and his astute and articulate daily assessments of the war were just part of that growing community of news gatherers taking to the networks ever since the Munich Crisis of 1938 legitimized broadcast journalism.

This commentary, given on October 5, 1939 talks about the attraction of Hitler to the German people and how people in general are mesmerized by his presence.

Raymond Gram Swing: “It’s well to bear in mind that Hitler never speaks at the microphone without the background of a frenzied audience. He never tries to talk quietly and persuasively to an individual listener. He talks to crowds who must give a crowds response. This is an essential of the totalitarian leadership."

Hmm. Frenzied crowds . . . Never talking quietly or persuasively. . . . .

During the 2008 campaign, Obama gave stirring but vacuous speeches in front large, adoring, and frenzied crowds and he succeeded beyond anyone's expectations. It is after the election, when he needed to provide calm, coherent, and persuasive arguments in favor of his policies, that the teleprompter president has failed. Rasmussen plots his failure to persuade:
MORE: Joseph Sobran (via Ann Coulter) explains Pres. Obama's communication style:

"Nor has he said anything memorable -- not even a single aphorism over this long campaign. And the title of his book 'The Audacity of Hope' -- what on earth does that mean? He is always hinting at a substance that is never disclosed to us. He seems to live by raising vague aspirations he never fulfills."

That may have worked well for him during the campaign but it doesn't work when he needs to explain actual policy decisions.

RECENTLY on Pres. Obama:
•The Obama administration plans for the future, illustrated
•John Stewart analyzes the Narcissist-in-Chief
•Obamacare endangers health coverage for 1.4 million workers
•A superpower run by amateurs

Why aren't Democrats more enthusiastic this year?

With all Obama's "accomplishments," by which I mean such disasters as nationalized auto manufacturers, Obamacare, and Porkulus, one would think that the Democrat donors would be writing big checks and Democrat voters would be enthusiastic about going to the polls on November 2.  But, they aren't.  Michael Barone explains that it isn't just the lack of a public option in Obamacare:

For it is not economics but foreign policy that has motivated the left half of the Democratic Party over the last decade. . . . .

They hoped to see an abject and abrupt withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq within weeks of the Obama inauguration. They hoped to see a beginning of withdrawal from Afghanistan not in July 2011 but in the early months of 2009. They hoped to see the detention facility at Guantanamo closed and shuttered and the detainees tried in civilian courts or freed to regale the media with tales of torture.

The uncomfortable truth is that many -- not most, but many -- Democratic politicians and Democratic voters saw political benefit in an American defeat in Iraq.

In other words, the left-half of the Democrat party is disappointed in Obama because he is insufficiently anti-American.

Why I'm voting Democrat (humor)

As collected from Twitter: I'm voting Democrat...

• Because I don't want to live in a Country where People are Held Responsible for the Results of Their Choices
• Because Companies should not be allowed to fail regardless of the cost to taxpayers
• Because I believe government must protect us from the Constitution!
• Because I don't want to live in a Country where People are Held Responsible for the Results of Their Choices
• Because I still believe the Times Square bomber was not a Muslim but someone from the Tea Party…
• Because the only property right I support is my right to your property.
• Standards are good, Double standards are twice as good
• b/c it's easier2blame Bush than consider .com bust, 9/11, or financial shift from purchase 2 piracy as economic factors
• Because I blame George Bush for my pitiful existence
• Because I love when Obama says "we're all our brother's keeper," even tho his brother George lives in a Nairobi hut on $10/year
• Because I'm so very, very wise. And Smart. Oh so smart. I listen to NPR y'know.
• Cause I enjoy biting off conservative people's fingers at California Tea Party rallies. Yummy!

PREVIOUSLY on the humorous side of our present predicament:
•Remember the couple that snuck into the White House with no credentials?
•How does a Democrat blow out candles?
•Bob Hope's greatest movie line
•If Pres. Obama was "amused" by the tea parties....
•Comedy in the tragedy
•Obamacare, illustrated
•Seeing the humor in a disaster
•Obamacare and trillions of dollars of unfunded mandates
•Where has the laughter gone?

Do you like disaster movies?

From Red State:

The Socialist
Directed by Ben Howe. Post-Producution by Caleb Howe.
Based on a script written by Karl Marx.
Screenplay conceived by The Sixties.
Edited by History. Starring Barack Obama as The Socialist

Hat tip: GatewayPundit.

If you prefer inspirational videos, see:
•Krista Branch sings "I am America"

Victims say clean energy is making life "unbearable" and destroying their property values

Art Lindgren and his wife, Cheryl, had enjoyed living on an island in Penobscot Bay. Then, when the clean energy facility was finished, the wind turbines started running. Today's New York Times reports:

“In the first 10 minutes, our jaws dropped to the ground,” Mr. Lindgren said. “Nobody in the area could believe it. They were so loud.”

Now, the Lindgrens, along with a dozen or so neighbors living less than a mile from the $15 million wind facility here, say the industrial whoosh-and-whoop of the 123-foot blades is making life in this otherwise tranquil corner of the island unbearable.

Homeowners around the US are taking legal action:

Lawsuits and complaints about turbine noise, vibrations and subsequent lost property value have cropped up in Illinois, Texas, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Massachusetts, among other states. . . .

In France, homeowners have had some success:

Similar conflicts are arising in Canada, Britain and other countries. An appeals court in Rennes, France, recently ordered an eight-turbine wind farm to shut down between 10 p.m. and 7 a.m. so residents could get some sleep.

In a controversial study, the Department of Energy says that any connection between turbine noise and lost property value is "inconclusive [PDF]." I suspect that the DoE researchers who wrote that study do not happen to live near a wind turbine.

PREVIOUSLY on the subject of environmentalism:
•Environmentalists more likely to cheat: being a liberal means not having to follow the rules
•The ever-increasing energy use of Al Gore's mansion
•Ethanol subsidies in perspective
•Global warming whitewash: Penn State and the Michael Mann
•Global warming's profiteers
•Penn State to investigate its global warmist Mann, or not
•Climategate: laws were broken
•The collapse of the UN IPCC's credibility
•Yet another UN IPCC Glacier-gate scandal
•UN IPCC claims of melting Himalayan glaciers exposed as fraud

Meet the candidates (San Jose, CA)

When: October 6th 2010, 11AM – 4PM: Candidates Speaking 11AM-1PM, mingling after
Where: San Jose State University campus Student Union, Umuhum Room

For more, see Campus Liberty Movement.

CNN's anti-semite: Update: Sanchez fired

Speaking on Pete Dominick's talk radio show, CNN anchor Rick Sanchez, a Cuban-American, complained about John Stewart and other Jews who "run" all the news networks. From Pete Dominick's blog:

When Pete [Dominick] suggested Jews (such as [Comedy Central's John] Stewart) have at least some sense of what it’s like to be an oppressed minority, Sanchez seemed to make the claim that Jews run CNN and the news business in general and that Stewart thus did not in fact know what it was like to feel the sting of prejudice.

“Yeah,” Sanchez snickered sarcastically at the idea that Jews are as much minorities as Latinos in the US.

Very powerless people… [snickers] He’s such a minority, I mean, you know [sarcastically]… Please, what are you kidding? … I’m telling you that everybody who runs CNN is a lot like Stewart, and a lot of people who run all the other networks are a lot like Stewart, and to imply that somehow they — the people in this country who are Jewish — are an oppressed minority? Yeah. [sarcastically]

That’s right, CNN anchor Rick Sanchez basically suggested that Jews have run the media.

Hat tip: GatewayPundit, Politico

UPDATE: CNN fires Rick Sanchez.

RELATED: Here is NewsBusters' collection of stories of Rick Sanchez's biases.

REVIOUSLY on anti-semitism:
•Hate crimes statistics, Jews, and Muslims, and more

•The left and its hatreds
•Democrats and anti-semitism
•Obama and anti-semitism
•Anti-semitism and the Connecticut Senate race

The Obama administration plans for the future, illustrated

From Michael Ramirez:

John Stewart analyzes the Narcissist-in-Chief

Things are bad for Democrats when even John Stewart is not defending them:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Indecision 2010 - Democratic Campaign Woes
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Rally to Restore Sanity

For more on the nature of Pres. Obama's narcissism, see Bookworm.

PREVIOUSLY on the subject of narcissism:
•Hybrid cars and narcissism
•Narcissist-in-Chief (with cartoon and photo)
•Study: Environmentalists more likely to "cheat" and "steal"
•Obama: "I want you to understand: this is not about me!"
•Obama: it's all about me!
•Confusing Compassion with Narcissism
•Obama's narcissism and the Chicago Olympics bid
•Environmentalism and Narcissism, II
•From OpenLeft: Is liberalism narcissism?
•Environmentalism and Narcissism,
•The side-effects of good intentions

Obamacare endangers health coverage for 1.4 million workers

The Wall Street Journal reports (hat tip: HAP):

McDonald's Corp. has warned federal regulators that it could drop its health insurance plan for nearly 30,000 hourly restaurant workers unless regulators waive a new requirement of the U.S. health overhaul.

McDonald's currently offers "mini-med" plans for its low-wage workers. Owing in part to frequent worker turnover, these plans have higher administrative costs so that they cannot meet the payout ratio of 80 to 85% that Obamacare requires. 1.4 million US workers have mini-med plans and, unless the rules change, could lose coverage.

What made Congress think it was smart enough to determine the right payout ratio? In other industries, payout ratios (or the ratio of product direct cost to price) depend on many factors and vary widely. As long as consumers are free to choose the product that best suits them, this is a not a problem. Now that Congress has set payout ratio requirements for medical care, there will likely be a long series of "unintended consequences." Taking just one as an example, health insurance companies spend a lot of money fighting insurance fraud. Obamacare's requirements for a high payout ratio limit this and could result in insurance fraud becoming more common: the criminals will get rich and the rest of us will pay for it with higher premiums.

UPDATE: The government grants waivers.

PREVIOUSLY on the subject of ObamaCare:
•ObamaCare threatens child-only insurance
•Medical insurance prices rising due to ObamaCare
•Obamacare endangers student health
•Obama's health care and economic policies explained
•Obamacare may raise insurance costs by 54%
•Harvard economist explains why Obamacare will raise premiums
•HHS says Obamacare will cause costs to go up and cause employers to drop coverage

Auto fatalities and the law of unintended consequences

Since texting while driving is clearly a stupid thing to do, has the banning of texting made the roads safer? No, says a new study. The Christian Science Monitor reports:

State laws prohibiting texting while driving have not reduced car crashes, and in some places may have actually increased the number of accidents, says new safety research released Tuesday. . . .

“There is a lot of media attention on the topic in general, but it’s difficult to find specific policy solutions,” says Fernando Wilson, an assistant professor at the University of North Texas in Denton. Last week, his study showing that texting while driving had increased auto fatalities by more than 16,000 between 2001 and 2007 was published in the American Journal of Public Health.

How could a ban on texting make driving less safe? One possible explanation is that the drivers who are stupid enough to text while driving probably also react to the law in a stupid manner. They may see the problem as one of avoiding getting caught which they could do by holding the phone lower in the car so others can't see it. Of course, by holding it lower, their eyes are further off the road than before, making their driving more dangerous.

Are their many people who actually text while driving? Wired reports that half of 18 to 24 year old drivers admit to texting while driving. Young and immortal.

PREVIOUSLY on unintended consequences:
•Liberals versus unintended consequences
•Campaign finance reform and unintended consequences
•Obama, liberal idealism, and unintended consequences
•San Francisco liberals drive blacks from city

Al Gore's favorite scientist arrested again

If you watch An Inconvenient Truth, you will hear Al Gore mentions only one scientist by name: James Hansen. If you were thinking that Hansen was a calm, rational, reasonable man of learning, then you should think again. From Nature:

NASA climate scientist James Hansen has gotten himself arrested while protesting mountaintop coal mining. Again.

The Huffington Post reports that he was among about 100 people arrested outside the White House yesterday while protesting this particularly troublesome form of coal mining. The same thing happened last June, a few months after Hansen proclaimed his willingness to be arrested during another protest.

WattsUpWithThat has more.

PREVIOUSLY on James Hansen:
•Former boss calls James Hansen call an embarrassment to NASA
•NASA's global warming scientists caught hyping false data
•James Hansen "muzzled" by Bush White House?

A superpower run by amateurs

The AP reports (hat tip: Instpundit) on yet another diplomatic gaffe by the Obama administration:

The U.S. government said Sunday it made an "honest mistake" when it displayed an inverted Philippine flag — which wrongfully signified that the Southeast Asian nation was in a state of war — in a meeting hosted by President Barack Obama.

The Philippine flag was displayed upside down behind President Benigno Aquino III when leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations met Obama in New York on Friday.  [Emph. added]

PREVIOUSLY on the subject of the amateurish nature of the Obama administration:
•War on Fox Noews shows White House's frustrations and amateurishness. (update)
•Amateur Hour at the State Dept.: the "reset" gaffe
•Amateur Hour: Obama discovers role of business
•Amateur hour at the White House: Obama snubs Brazil's President

Pot growers oppose pot legalization

This November, California will vote on Proposition 19 which legalizes and taxes marijuana. The Rand corporation forecasts that, if passed, this would lower pot prices by as much as 90%. With pot being a major cash crop in parts of Northern California, NBC/Los Angeles reports that pot farmers and the government officials that they support both "fear" this possible loss of revenue:

The potential price drop has brought unexpected opposition, or at least suspicion, from rural pot farmers who fear the loss of their traditional, though legally risky, way of life.

Marijuana has become so crucial to rural economies along the state's North Coast that even some local government officials are working on plans for coping with a pot downturn.

PREVIOUSLY on this year's pot legalization campaign in California:
•Prop. 19 supporters at the San Francisco rally for John Dennis (who is the Republican challenger to Nancy Pelosi)
•California's upcoming ballot proposition: a quick look
•Conservatives go to pot
•"Legalize today; get high tonight"

November is coming

Fiorina losing ground against Boxer

According to RealClearPolitics compilation of polls, Carly Fiorina had nearly pulled even with incumbent Sen. Boxer (D-CA, shown at right) two weeks ago but her poll numbers have dropped precipitously since then:

UPI reports that Fiorina's supporters lack enthusiasm:

Two-thirds of respondents in the survey taken statewide Sept. 14-21 said their preference for Fiorina was largely based on disapproval of Boxer rather than support of Fiorina, the Chronicle said.

An advantage that California Sen. Boxer has over challenger Fiorina is that Boxer has supported Pres. Obama and, unlike much of the country, Pres. Obama is actually popular in California. Rasmussen reports:

Fifty-seven percent (57%) in California approve of the job President Obama is doing, while 42% disapprove. Those ratings are better than those found nationally for the president in the Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll.

PREVIOUSLY on the always outrageous Sen. Boxer:
•Even global warmists like Senator Boxer are backing away from IPCC
•Ma'am Sen. Boxer for and against climate whistleblowers.
•Will Boxer go the way of Coakley?: CA Senate race tightens (Jan. 2010)
•Boxer and Kerry campaign for cap-and-tax
•Cap and tax in the US Senate: a who's who of the villains and their committees
•Boxer: Never trust anyone who is well dressed

Gov. Christie's greatest hits

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is a politician who knows how to speak plainly and clearly:


PREVIOUSLY on Gov. Christie:
•Gov. Christie on New Jersey and the astounding greed of its teacher's unions
•U.S. Attorney Christopher Christie prosecutes terrorists

Saddam provided terrorists with money, training camps, and weapons says ex-Minister Aziz

This week, the AP has obtained records of the FBI's interrogation of former Iraqi Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz (pictured). According to the notes, Aziz acknowledges that Saddam's Iraq supported terrorists: Saddam provided Islamist terrorists with land with which to raise money (via farming) while also housing a training camp. In addition, Saddam provided them with AK-47 machine guns. While Aziz denied a direct connection with bin Laden, the AP writes:

Aziz acknowledged, however, that the Saddam regime supported other terrorists, including notorious Palestinian militant Abul Abbas, mastermind of the 1985 hijacking of the Achille Lauro cruise ship. American passenger Leon Klinghoffer was killed by the terrorists and his body dumped into the Mediterranean. Abbas was captured in Iraq by U.S. forces in April 2003 and died in custody 11 months later.

Aziz said Baghdad gave Abbas a farm to allow him to generate money for the Palestinian cause. "The farm evolved into a camp where Abul Abbas would train fighters with AK-47s" provided by the Iraqi government, Aziz said, according to a summary of his May 6, 2004 interrogation.

PREVIOUSLY on the subject of terrorism:
•9-11 in review

•Round-up of left-wing terrorism
•Yet another left-wing terrorist
•Obama's humane plan for terrorists: kill rather than interrogate
•The root cause of terrorism
•Gitmo torture: Metallica is proud of its music's message to terrorists
•Speaker Pelosi's deep thoughts on giving Miranda rights to terrorists.
•AG Eric Holder was for enhanced interrogation before he was against it.
•The NY Times finally admits we were fighting Al Qaeda in Iraq
•Gitmo torture tactic revealed: "she touched my thigh!"
•Terror color codes updated for Obama (illustrated)
•NY Times skeptical of Bush but trusts terrorists
•Global warming predicted to cause more terrorism
•Before Al Qaeda: the socialist-terrorist alliance of the 1980s

First human-powered ornithopter

The (Toronto) Star reports:

A University of Toronto engineering graduate student has made aviation history, successfully flying the first ever human-powered flapping-wing aircraft continuously.

Todd Reichert, a PhD candidate at the university’s Institute of Aerospace Studies, piloted the wing-flapping aircraft, sustaining both altitude and airspeed for 19.3 seconds and covering a distance of 145 metres at an average speed of 25.6 kilometres per hour.

Ornithopters (flapping-wing aircraft) have been around for a while but this is the first one efficient enough to carry a human while not requiring more than the limited power that a human can produce.

While it is unlikely that ornithopters will ever be as fast as jet planes, there are other uses for airplanes for which the ornithopter's potential for being quieter and more efficient could be important. In any event, this flight is another human accomplishment. Here is the video:

ObamaCare threatens child-only insurance

The Washington Post reports (via Instapundit):

Some of the country's most prominent health insurance companies have decided to stop offering new child-only plans, rather than comply with rules in the new health-care law that will require such plans to start accepting children with preexisting medical conditions after Sept. 23.

The reasons for this are, of course, the perverse incentives created by Obamacare:

Robert Zirkelbach, a spokesman for AHIP, noted that insurers will be accepting children with preexisting conditions in other types of plans.

But, he said, extending such coverage in child-only policies "provides a very powerful incentive for a parent to wait until their child becomes very sick before purchasing coverage." [Emph. added]

RELATED:  Under Massachusetts' version of Obamacare, emergency room visits have increased.

PREVIOUSLY on the subject of ObamaCare:
•Medical insurance prices rising due to ObamaCare
•Obamacare endangers student health
•Obama's health care and economic policies explained
•Obamacare may raise insurance costs by 54%
•Harvard economist explains why Obamacare will raise premiums
•HHS says Obamacare will cause costs to go up and cause employers to drop coverage

It's a paradox: Congress unpopular "despite record"

A Bloomberg News story highlights a conundrum: how could it be that Democrats are unpopular "despite" their "record of legislative achievement that rivals President Lyndon Johnson's `Great Society'":Hat tip: BotW.

A rational reporter would have written that Democrats were unpopular because of their record, not despite it.

PREVIOUSLY on the paradoxes that vex liberal minds:
•"Ironically," conservatives and their children are happier
•It's a paradox!: Crime down when criminals are in jail.
•Paradox: crime is down (again)
•Paradox: few fraudulent voters if voters are required to have IDs