Kowabunga

Debra Saunders over at the SF Gate, and picked up by the Star Tribune, has a lot to say about Barbara Boxer and Global warming. It's a fine piece and I encourage reading it.

Sen. Barbara Boxer of California delivered a speech in the Senate last week in which she linked global warming to the San Diego wildfires, Darfur, the imminent loss of the world's polar bears and even a poor 14-year-old boy who died from "an infection caused after swimming in Lake Havasu," because its water is warmer.

Forget arson. Forget genocide. Forget nature. There is no tragedy that cannot be placed at the doorstep of global-warming skeptics.

I missed Boxer's speech, but I am not surprised by her claims that all that is bad in the world right now can be blamed on Global warming and, consequently, on America as it is the biggest producer of greenhouse gases alleged to be causing the current warming trends (despite the volumes of scientific evidence to the contrary!).

Saunders enlightens us to some history on Boxer's stand on Global Warming: Boxer was one of 95 senators that voted in support of a resolution directing then President Clinton NOT to sign on to any global warming treaty (Kyoto!). Now she has changed her tune, and she has done so with a vengeance.

There is also the ongoing battles between Boxer and Inhofe on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. Inhofe strikes me as someone who looks at the facts and doesn't eliminate those that do not fit the conclusions he wants to push.

Last month, Inhofe took on the Al Gore suggestion that polar bears are in peril because of global warming. Inhofe pointed to U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services estimates that show the polar bear population at about 20,000 to 25,000 bears -- up from the estimated 5,000 to 10,000 polar bears in the 1950s and 1960s.

The polar bear population, much like the timber wolf and bald eagle, has been on the rise, despite global warming. Yet Boxer is cited as claiming otherwise:

Boxer rejected Inhofe's claim that there are more polar bears, selectively citing the "best-studied population" of Canada's western Hudson Bay that found a 22 percent reduction of polar bears from 1987 to 2004. Then she referred to a World Conservation Union prediction that the polar bear population will drop by 30 percent by 2050

Of course for the area that Boxer cites to prove her point is accurate FOR THAT AREA. That is not sufficient to make a global claim when other data shows just the opposite.

Saunders mentions the new book by Bjorn Lomborg called "Cool It, the Skeptical Environmentalist's Guide to Global Warming," which mentions the polar bear population studies, and what Saunders cites from his book also refutes the Boxer/Gore claim that polar bears are heading towards extinction. I'll have to add this book to my reading list.

The bottom line isn't a matter of whether or not the Earth's temperature is climbing and that the climate is changing. It is! We can debate the causes of the changes on end, as long as scientific fact is fully included and recognized in the debate. But to use scare-mongering tactics and blaming all of the Earth's woes on global warming doesn't do anybody any good. Unless you are running against Boxer when she comes up for re-election in 2010. This could provide plenty of ammunition to a GOP opponent looking to unseat Boxer.

Let's face it: fear-mongering makes good press and plays well to the Leftist agenda while scientific fact is forced to take a backseat.

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Debra Saunders Boxer Gore Polar Bears

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It was just a week or so ago that Prince made the news when it was revealed that his representatives had demanded the removal of a family home video from youtube because it contained a short music clip of his in the background. The video was reported as being a 30-second clip of an 18 month old child dancing to a Prince song playing on the radio. The article I read mentioned that the parent at the receiving end of Prince's demand to remove the video from youtube was shocked by such a demand. It was at that time that it was revealed that Prince spends significant amounts of time trolling the Internet looking for people who have posted anything that may be his.

Copyright laws are specific about allowing fair use. It is one thing to have a 30-second video of a child dancing with the background music being in the background (and poor audio quality) and not in the foreground, and another to put the entire song on the web for people to download. To Prince, audio quality and fair use be damned, sue them all!

Now the Guardian in the UK is reporting the next wave of Prince's activities to squash his fan base and free speech. His attorneys are threatening to sue fan sites for publishing a variety of content and demanding compensation.

A coalition named Prince Fans United, representing Housequake.com, Princefans.com and Prince.org, has been formed by the website organisers to fight back. They said they would contest the action on the basis that it was an attempt "to stifle all critical commentary about Prince". They added that the "cease and desist" notices went as far as calling for the removal of pictures taken by fans of their Prince tattoos and their vehicles carrying Prince-inspired licence plates.

Okay, he may have a point when it comes to a fan site publishing transcriptions of his songs without permission. But Prince is also demanding the removal of pictures that his fans have taken of their "Prince" tattoos. Okay, maybe he has a point there, too. Just not the same point as publishing the transcriptions of his songs.

Overall, it sounds like Prince is over-reacting to the many fan-sites out there, and may well alienate a lot of his fans. For some of those fans, it will be easier to change their license plates on their cars than removing their "Prince" tattoos. And Prince may not even be able to give away his next album.

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Prince Music Purple Rain Internet Fandom

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The Randi Rhodes story has blossomed into something that one can only expect from the hard-left. From the Daily News:

Air America radio host Randi Rhodes is temporarily off the air, but claims she was brutally attacked near her Manhattan apartment are bogus, her lawyer and a police source said today.

Fellow host Jon Elliott claimed on the liberal radio network that Rhodes had been mugged while walking her dog, Simon, on Sunday night. Elliot, who said Rhodes lost several teeth in the attack, waxed about a possible conspiracy.

"Is this an attempt by the right-wing, hate machine to silence one of our own?" he asked on the air, according to Talking Radio, a blog. "Are we threatening them? Are they afraid that we're winning? Are they trying to silence intimidate us?"

The article goes on to state that Rhodes fell and hit her head while walking her dog. Rhodes has not filed a police report nor claimed to have been mugged. The whole idea that she was mugged "by the right-wing hate machine" is a fabrication, either by Air America host Jon Elliot or by a blogger at Air America.

October 16-NEW YORK-On Sunday evening, October 14, Air America host Randi Rhodes experienced an unfortunate incident hindering her from hosting her show. The reports of a presumed hate crime are unfounded. Ms. Rhodes looks forward to being back on the air on Thursday.

Amazing…I started writing this piece this morning, didn't finish, and checked the originating blogger post, and guess what I found. The guy at Talking Radio Blog has perpetrated a hoax. His reasoning is that he is retaliating against Limbaugh's "phony soldiers" comment and the context it was made, so he cooked up his context on the Randi Rhodes story, now claiming that the context was in the sense that Liberal Talk Radio is frequently attacked by "right-wingers." And people, including those at Air America, bought into it, with many main-stream blogs linking to his original post. This explains why his post, which referred to an Air America blog and he quoted, links back to his blog. This is what I suspected was the case.

Here's what the hoaxer now says(no link...cut and paste: talkingradio.blogspot.com/2007/10/what-difference-day-makes.html):

When 41 members of the U.S. Senate and members of the anti-Iraq war veterans group votevets.org expressed outrage over Rush Limbaugh's "phony soldier" remark, the right-wing talk show host said that his critics didn't consider the "context" in which his remark was made.

Well, we too have a "context" issue. Our coverage of the alleged attack on Randi Rhodes was presented in the "context" of several very real politically motivated attacks against liberal stations and talk hosts. We chronicled the recent shooting at a lib talk station in Houston, a death threat directed to Stephanie Miller, and a beating received by Tom Leykis. We also, referred to several incidents that may be forgotten because they occurred several years ago - e.g. shots fired at Thom Hartmann's car, transmitters blown up in Texas, and most tragically, the murder of lib talk show host Alan Berg.

So, his context is that he is upset about some stuff purported to have taken place but no one has ever heard of, therefore it is okay to claim that a liberal talk show host was mugged in an anti-liberal hate crime.

This is the kind of idiot I served my country to protect and give the right to free speech. To me a hoax like this is the same as going into a movie theater and shouting "fire" when there isn't one. I wonder if this peckawood ever served in the Armed Forces…

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Randi Rhodes Hate Crime Talking Radio Air America Hoax

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Columbia University: Supporters of terrorism and genocide welcome, but not the ROTC. There is something wrong with this picture. From FoxNews:

Columbia University said it would welcome any notable figure visiting the United States - even Adolf Hitler himself - to speak to students and faculty at the Ivy League college.

But there are those who question what the New York college's standards are. They ask why a school that will not allow an ROTC program to be part of its curriculum would allow Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, one of America's avowed enemies, onto its campus.

Ahmadinejad has routinely called for the annihilation of Israel, and it is Iran that has supported, along with Syria, Hezbollah and other armed terrorist groups operating in the Palestine Authoity. It is also Iran that has been supplying arms, munitions, training, personnel and money to al-Qaeda in Iraq and other sectarian militant factions operating to destabilize efforts to establish democracy in Iraq.

Columbia has also made it clear that if this were 1940 they would welcome Hitler, the man who originated the annihilation of the Jews and brought the world the Holocaust. Hitler was directly responsible for the murder of millions of people for no greater crime than their religious beliefs.

I suppose that Columbia would also welcome with open arms Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot and a host of other mass murderers.

Critics wonder why the leader of a nation that exports terrorism is allowed to speak, but the leader of an American organization that seeks to secure U.S. borders was not.

I guess the answer is simple: Like nearly all universities in America, it is controlled by the hate-America, hate-Bush crowd of leftists. They love America's enemies regardless of how many people they have helped to murder. The leader to secure borders referenced was the leader of the Minutemen who is pushing to secure our nation's borders to reduce the influx of illegal aliens.

However, for me, it's the not allowing ROTC programs on campus that gets my goat.

Whether or not Ahmadinejad should be allowed to speak is something open to debate. As he is the leader of a nation that committed an act of war against the United States, and he was directly involved in that act, as well as the fact that Iran is carrying out covert (and occasionally overt) acts of war against our allies in the Middle East, I don't think he should be allowed such platforms.

Although it is true that the U.N. treaty forces the U.S. to not deny access to any world leader, regardless of how repugnant that "leader" is, is just one more reason to say that the U.N. has outlived its usefulness.

As for Ahmadinejad, I am with the protestors: Iwannajihad Ahmadinejad Go Home!

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Ahmadinejad Iran Iraq Columbia U.N.

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Looks like 60 Minutes is continuing its tryst with murdering terrorist thugs, this time Ahmadinejad. This is off of Drudge:

PELLEY: Sir, what were you thinking? The World Trade Center site is the most sensitive place in the American heart, and you must have known that visiting there would be insulting to many, many Americans.

AHMADINEJAD: Why should it be insulting?

PELLEY: But the American people, sir, believe that your country is a terrorist nation, exporting terrorism in the world. You must have known that visiting the World Trade Center site would infuriate many Americans.

First off, it would be insulting because A) you are a dictator, B) you export terror to Iraq and Israel, C) you are a Holocaust denier, D) you routinely call for the annihilation of Israel. Is that not reason enough to be insulted by your presence within the United States let alone at the World Trade Center site?

Unfortunately, it looks like we have to give Ahmadinejad safe conduct from the airport to the U.N. headquarters. However, beyond that, is it really necessary? Since he is going to speak at Columbia University (they should be embarrassed about having him there), couldn't we say, legally, no safe conduct there and arrest him for his role in the embassy hostage crisis that he was directly involved in as one of the leading thugs?

Let us remember that the embassy invasion back in the '70s was an act of war and we have yet to truly resolve our grievances with Iran because of it.

On the flip side, maybe we'll get lucky and some enterpsring student at Columbia University will record it and post it on youtube. Especially if he goes off on one of his "destroy Israel" rants.

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Ahmadinejad Iran

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Dan Ra^ther, the man who, like the Eveready bunny, seems to keep going and going and going. Or, to coin another phrase: "He's back!"

Yep, Dan Ra^ther, who, during the 2004 election campaign, put forth a story on "60 Minutes II" that used forged documents to further the leftist agenda that President Bush was AWOL during his time in the Air National Guard. The allegations have repeatedly been proven to be completely false, and in the case of the forged documents, it was Little Green Footballs that proved they were written on computer technology that did not exist during Bush's time in the ANG.

Ra^ther is now claiming that CBS made him a scapegoat and that his employers "botched" the aftermath of the story and forced him to be the fall guy. Never mind the fact that he was directly responsible for vetting the legitimacy of the documents he was using to prove his hit piece story, which also failed to bear any resemblance to facts.

Now he is suing CBS and Viacom for $70 million.

From Breitbart:

Rather narrated a September 2004 report saying that Bush had disobeyed orders and shirked some of his duties during his National Guard service and that a commander felt pressured to sugarcoat Bush's record.

In his lawsuit, Rather maintains that the story was true, but that if any aspect of the broadcast wasn't accurate, he was not responsible for the errors.

Dan Ra^ther fails the test of manhood: taking responsibility for your actions rather than blaming others for your failures. And Ra^ther still claims that his story is true despite the overwhelming body of facts that proves it was all a lie?

What ticks me off about the whole thing is that despite the fact that the documents were proven to be forgeries written on a computer using Microsoft Word, the article uses the following: "Critics questioned the documents' authenticity and suggested they were forged." The documents were, in fact, forgeries.

The article points out that Ra^ther, at the time he pushed his agenda driven hit piece on America weeks before an election, was making $6 million a year. Must be nice to make that kind of change.

I agree with the CBS spokesman that said the suit is old news and without merit.

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Rathergate Dan Rather Bush ANG AWOL 60 Minutes

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I seriously doubt that anyone has not heard about the vandalism of the Vietnam Memorial by now. FoxNews has an update where the Park Police confirm that it was an act of vandalism and not an accident. 14 of the panels were damaged by this despicable crime.

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund is offering a reward for information that leads to the arrest and conviction of the perps.

As this crime took place several days before the anti-terrorist activists descended on D.C. to hold their anti-war rally, there may not be a direct connection.

I hope they do find the perps and find some suitable punishment, including publicizing their names and pictures across the country. I wanted not want such scumbags working for me. Would you?

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Vietnam Memorial vandalism

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The Associated Press -Ipsos poll on reading in America has been released. It took little time for a hard-left liberal/progressive to tout the survey as indicative that Liberals read and Conservatives don't despite that it is not possible to make such inferences based on the data released. Now, if the cross-tabulated data is ever released, we may be able to learn something. It is also important to realize that the poll was of 1003 people, in a country with a population of over 300 million people.

From Breit Bart:

Liberals read more books than conservatives. The head of the book publishing industry's trade group says she knows why-and there's little flattering about conservative readers in her explanation.

"The Karl Roves of the world have built a generation that just wants a couple slogans: 'No, don't raise my taxes, no new taxes,'" Pat Schroeder, president of the American Association of Publishers, said in a recent interview. "It's pretty hard to write a book saying, 'No new taxes, no new taxes, no new taxes' on every page."

Schroeder, who as a Colorado Democrat was once one of Congress' most liberal House members, was responding to an Associated Press-Ipsos poll that found people who consider themselves liberals are more prodigious book readers than conservatives.

She said liberals tend to be policy wonks who "can't say anything in less than paragraphs. We really want the whole picture, want to peel the onion."

The American Association of Publishers should be embarrassed by having their president make such insulting statements, especially since these statements are not defensible. And should they keep in their employ someone who insults a large segment of the population?

We all know that left-wingnuts and liberals control the publishing industry, just as they control the main stream media and the entertainment industry. That, like the tripe coming out of Hollywood, makes it hard to find good books worth reading.

Yet they feel secure to insult the book buying public despite the fact that the sales of books by conservatives do exceptionally well. If conservatives don't read, who's buying all of those books?

Also, the survey asks people how many books they have started and failed to finish. Quite a few there. Then there is the question of the religion of the person being surveyed. Based on the survey, where the number of Muslims reading books is ZERO, someone like Schroeder would naturally assume that Muslims don't read. Yet we all know that this is far from the truth.

As for who's reading what books, the indicators are that older people read far more books than younger people, and younger people tend to be more "liberal" and read more text books.

I read about 50 books per year, ranging from fiction (including SF and Fantasy) to technical books (due to my job) to hard science, current events and politics. I am not a left-winger.

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American Association of Publishers Pat Schroeder Polling AP-Ipsos Books

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I cal this poetic justice. From FoxNews:

A Michigan man scrubbed a monument to U.S. troops with a toothbrush Tuesday while wearing a T-shirt that read "I Stole From Veterans" as part of a punishment for a scam to solicit scrap yards for metal, the Saginaw News reports.

There is more on the Saginaw News site.

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BreitBart TV has a video of two Islamic "students" arrested and charged for possession of pipe bombs. In the video, a spokesman from CAIR claims that these pipe bombs were nothing more than firecrackers.

BBTV

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Terrorism

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The post-35W bridge collapse has had an interesting play on talk radio. I have noticed that the conservative opinion makers on the AM and FM dial have taken the tact of reporting only on the facts of the tragic incident, and have avoided getting into speculation as to the causes or the "blame game." Meanwhile, just for the heck of it, I tuned into AM950 to get a whiff of how they were handling it. The difference is night and day. Where Conservatives are treating this with great respect and solemnity, the Leftists, especially their callers, are busily politicizing the incident and looking for black helicopters.

The show on 950 that I caught a blurb of is the Ed Schultz Show. He was no where near as bad as some of his callers, one of whom asked "when is bush going to blame al-Qaeda." To his credit, Schultz stated that there is no evidence pointing to this being an act of terrorism. There was also a great deal of blaming Governor Pawlenty, Republicans, and even some placed on Ventura. It was truly whacked-out listening.

I checked out Schultz's website to see if he archived his show there as I would like to get a recording of some of the calls that were made.

I did see something I thought was interesting on a different issue. He is currently running a poll in regards to Obama's statement about invading Pakistan to go after terrorists.

Do you agree with Barack Obama's comment to hunt terrorists in Pakistan even without local permission if warranted?

Currently, 62% of those responding to the poll say "yes." In other words, 62% say they wish to violate the sovereignty of an ally (even a poor ally) in order to hunt terrorists. What an idea: commit an act of war against an ally that has nuclear weapons!

This is not to say that Schultz agrees with waging war with Pakistan, just asking his readers.

As for his handling of the bridge collapse, he may be a bit whacky, but he is no where near as nutty as some of his callers are.

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Air America Schultz MN

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The Hill has just released its list of the 50 most "beautiful" people on Capitol Hill. Number 4 on the list is that left-wingnut from San Francisco, Nancy Pelosi. Rep. Michelle Bachmann (R-MN) is not even on the list, let alone in the top five.

All I can say is: whoever compiled this list must not have ever seen Michelle Bachmann.

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Pelosi Bachman Congress

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This is in the category of "It's about bloody time!" Ward Churchill, now former professor of Colorado University, has been fired for academic misconduct and plagiarism. Quite frankly, his calling the victims of the 9/11 attacks "little Eichmans" should have been enough for his immediate dismissal. It's too bad that it took this long to terminate him. What is also disturbing is they are paying him a year's salary as part of the termination. That must be nice. Get fired for cause and still get paid.

From Channel 9 News:

Churchill touched off a firestorm in 2005 after an essay surfaced which he wrote shortly after 9/11 likening some victims in the World Trade Center to Adolf Eichmann, who helped carry out the Holocaust.

University officials concluded he could not be fired for his comments because they were protected by the First Amendment, but they launched an investigation into allegations that he fabricated or falsified his research and plagiarized the work of others.

In 2006, a university committee found Churchill guilty of academic misconduct, including plagiarism and a faculty panel recommended he be demoted and suspended for a year without pay. In May, CU President Hank Brown recommended Churchill be fired.

In general, I guess they are right about the free speech part, however private companies can and do fire high profile employees for making such stupid statements as Churchill did in 2005, as it can be construed to reflect on their employer.

It is also disappointing that it took that incident to trigger an investigation into the allegations that he was an academic fraud.

Even though it took a long time before the Board of Regents took action, at least they did the right thing for reasons that can be defended.

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Ward Churchill Moonbat Colorado

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Somehow, I am not surprised to learn that one of the border patrol agents now serving time for his involvment in the shooting of a drug smuggler has been assaulted while serving his sentence. From FoxNews:

One of two former Border Patrol agents sentenced to more than a decade in prison for shooting and wounding a suspected Mexican drug smuggler was beaten by a group of inmates last weekend, a Texas congressman confirmed Tuesday to FOXNews.com.

Ignacio Ramos, who was transferred to the Yazoo City Federal Correctional Complex in Mississippi last month to begin serving his 12-year sentence for the February 2005 shooting of Osbaldo Aldrete-Davila, was placed in a special housing unit after the incident pending an investigation, according to T.J. Bonner, president of the National Border Patrol Council.

From Grassfire.org:

Less than one week after being transfered to a federal prison, Ignacio "Nacho" Ramos was severely beaten by as many as five illegal immigrants who, during that attack shouted, "Death to the Border Agent!"

These two agents were only doing their job, and it is an outrage that the drug smuggler in this incident, who was attempting to bring 800 pounds of drugs into the U.S., was sought out by Federal Agents in order to prosecute Ramos and Compean.

By allowing their convictions to stand, the U.S. sends a signal to smugglers and terrorists that they have free reign to violate our borders and destroy the careers of our law enforcement agents. It also tells our Border Agents that the U.S. will not stand by them in the aftermath of a shooting when drug smugglers are involved. With signals like that, it makes their job harder, and more dangerous.

Please consider signing the petition to pardon these two agents at grassfire.org.

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Ramos Compean Border Patrol Pardon

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Ronald Reagan was born on this day in 1911. I had the great fortune to grow up in California while he served as Governor. Later, I had the great honor of serving in the USAF with Reagan as my Commander In Chief.

He is without any doubt, the best president the Unite States has had in my lifetime.

I only wish we had more leaders like him.

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The nation was stunned and shocked this week by the brutal slaying of a group of young girls in a small Amish community in Pennsylvania. There is no doubt in my mind that their murderer was a nutcase, and the news reports back this up with revelations from the notes that Charles Carl Roberts IV left behind.

Now, from a FoxNews article, a sickening twist:

The Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kan., planned to boycott funerals for the victims Thursday and Friday. The church claims on its Web site that the shooting spree was carried out by a "mad man" in retribution for Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell's "blasphemous sins against WBC." The site says Rendell "slandered and mocked and ridiculed and condemned Westboro Baptist Church on national Fox TV" and that he "revealed a conspiracy to employ the State's police powers to destroy WBC in order to silence WBC's Gospel message."

Fortunately, the local community has stated that they will take a stand to block any protests at the funerals of these young Amish girls.

It is regrettable that we live in an age where zealots such as the members of the Westboro Baptist Church will use any tragedy that receives national attention as a forum for spreading their poisonous message and promote their agenda of hate and intolerance.

Fortunately, in a follow-up piece, the WBC nut jobs have announced a decision NOT to carry out the planned protests. Regardless of their motivations, they are still a bunch of nuts:

"Those Amish people, everyone is sitting around talking about those poor little girls - blah, blah, blah - they brought the wrath upon themselves," Phelps-Roper said, adding that the Amish "don't serve God, they serve themselves."

As you can see, these people are real Nutcases!

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