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May 14, 2010
Posted by seamus in: Accountability, Advice, Attitude, Business, Cap and Trade, Commentary, Communications, Congress, Creative Writing, Current Events, Democrat, Economics, Entertainment, Finance, Freedom, General Topics, Geopolitical Events, Governance, Homeland Security, Humor, Journalism, Life Experiences, Lifestyle, Literature, Minorities, Morality, Motivation, Opinion, Personal Experiences, Politics, Recovery, Republican, Satire, Self-Help, Social Aspects, Social Issues, Sociology, Terrorism, The Economy, The Media, The Pundit's Corner, Women's Rights, Working Women, World Issues
 Leave a comment Pick Your Reason 10. I voted Democrat because I believe oil companies’ profits of 4% on a gallon of gas are obscene but the government taxing the same gallon of gas at 15% isn’t. 9. I voted Democrat because I believe the government will do a better job of spending the [...] May 4, 2010
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Commentary, Current Events, Energy, Opinion
Leave a comment Big Oil: A Failure to Communicate By Alan Caruba In the movie, “Cool Hand Luke”, the warden of the prison camp explains his harsh treatment saying, “What we have here is a failure to communicate.” I was thinking of that in the wake of the BP oil rig disaster because, it has long seemed to me that the oil industry has failed to communicate its story to Americans. Instead, it has slunk around with its tail between its legs frequently apologizing for playing an absolutely essential role in the success of the nation. In his new book, “Power Hungry: The Myths of ‘Green’ Energy and the Real Fuels of the Future”, my friend Robert Bryce says, “Amidst all the rhetoric about the evils of oil, the evils of OPEC, the claims that we are ‘addicted’ to oil, that oil fosters terrorism, that we can ‘win the oil endgame’, or that oil is killing the planet, the simple unavoidable truth is that using oil makes us rich. In fact, if oil didn’t exist, we’d have to invent it.” The formula is simplicity itself. “As oil consumption increases, so does prosperity. In the countries where oil demand is more than 12 barrels per capita per year, gross domestic production (GDP) is at least two times as high as those where oil demand is six barrels or lower.” Continue reading Big Oil: A Failure to Communicate April 7, 2010
Posted by Muhammad Cohen in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Commentary, Communications, Congress, Current Events, Democrat, Healthcare, Marketing, Medical, Republican, Travel
One comment Republicans were for healthcare insurance mandates before they were against them – and the Obama White House missed it. [...] March 9, 2010
Posted by Muhammad Cohen in: Business, Cap and Trade, Current Events, Energy, Environment, Environmental Issues, Foreign Affairs, Global Warming
Leave a comment Sustainable palm oil production shouldn’t be an oxymoron. [...] January 24, 2010
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Commentary, Congress, Current Events, Democrat, Economic Crisis, Environment, Governance, Opinion
One comment The Bill Comes Due for Socialism in America By Alan Caruba “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people’s money.” — Margaret Thatcher, former British Prime Minister It began as a beautiful cruise to a land of “hope and change”, but it has become a nightmare in which the ship of state is being deliberately steered toward a whirlpool of debt from which, if Obama is successful, the nation cannot escape. One of the primary reasons the U.S. economy has grown over the years has been the confidence in its innovation and productivity. It has generated investment from around the world from those who wanted to profit from our success story. There was a time when U.S. securities were the safest in the world, but that is no longer the case. On December 24, 2009, the U.S. Senate voted to raise the ceiling of the government debt to $12.4 trillion, described by an Associated Press reporter as “a massive increase over the current limit and a political problem that President Barack Obama has promised to address next year.” On January 20, 2010, barely a month later, Senate Democrats “proposed allowing the federal government to borrow an additional $1.9 trillion to pay bills, a record increase that would permit the national debt to reach $14.3 trillion.” Continue reading The Bill Comes Due for Socialism in America January 6, 2010
Posted by Muhammad Cohen in: Cap and Trade, China, Commentary, Current Events, Environment, Environmental Issues, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Relations, Geopolitical Events, Global Warming
Leave a comment China and US have taken the lead in saving earth away from the UN and fellow travelers that were bungling the job. [...] December 17, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Commentary, Congress, Current Events, Governance, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment Why You’re Broke By Alan Caruba While it is incontestably true that a lot of people took out mortgage loans they could not afford to replay, it is just as true that they were encouraged to do so because banks were required by federal law to make these bad loans. Bankers even gave them an acronym, “Ninja” loans as in “No Income, No Job, No Assets.” The result was the government created “housing bubble” that was coupled with the Federal Reserves’ policy of keeping interest rates so low that many were tempted to borrow beyond their means. When the financial crisis struck, these loans were called “toxic assets” requiring billions in taxpayer money to bail out the same banks forced to make them. Mortgage loan companies were not so fortunate. Consistent with that government inspired economic disaster, however, has been the many ways federal and state governments have found to tax Americans directly and indirectly. A new book, “Bankrupting Joe the Taxpayer”, by D.J. Golio ($24.95/$16.95, Authorhouse, hard and softcover) reveals how taxation and irrational government spending has reached the present point and offers suggestions how to correct it. A classic example of hidden taxes can be found in your telephone bill. This month mine was $63.00, but $14.00 of it was taxes, so my actual cost was less than $50. This occurs again every time I fill up my gas tank or pay my utility bill. For example, in 2007 the estimated take by states alone in gasoline taxes exceeded $50 billion. Continue reading Why You’re Broke December 8, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, China, Commentary, Current Events, Energy, Environment, Opinion
Leave a comment A Vital Difference Today Between China and America By Alan Caruba “The joke among China hands goes like this,” says Michael Economides. “If the Americans and the Chinese start talking about a major project today, in two years the Chinese will be done and the Americans will still be talking and applying for permits.” Economides is an internationally recognized expert on energy. The Editor-in-Chief of Energy Tribune, he is the author of “From Soviet to Putin and Back: The Dominance of Energy in Today’s Russia”, co-authored with Donna Marie D’Aleo, published in 2008. This year has seen the publication of a new book, written with Xina Xie, a Research Professor at the University of Wyoming, “Energy: China’s Choke Point.” The joke, as his new book makes clear, is on us. After many disastrous decades under the leadership of Chairman Mae Zedong, China in effect retained communism as its government model, but threw it away as its economic model. In effect, it embraced capitalism and, in sharp contrast to America’s economy, its economy is growing at a rate of nine percent per year. Continue reading A Vital Difference Today Between China and America November 27, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Commentary, Current Events, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Opinion
4 comments A Political Who’s Who of Global Warming Liars By Alan Caruba As the global warming fraud unravels, it’s a good time to look at the politicians who have been some of the most outspoken advocates, using global warming/climate change to advance “Cap-and-Trade” legislation and other related laws and regulations. Top of the list is President Barack Obama who has made many references to “climate change” and “global warming” to further this national and international fraud. He’ll pick up his Nobel Peace Prize in December; the same one given to Al Gore and the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change a few years back. Further proof of his mendacity will be his attendance at the UN Climate Change Conference in Denmark. Speaking on World Environment Day last June, Obama said of global warming, “We’re going to have to make some tough decisions and take concrete actions if we are going to deal with a potentially cataclysmic disaster.” This mirrors years of similar doomsday statements by former Vice President Al Gore. This is the kind of drivel Americans and others around the world have heard from their supposed “leaders” for far too long. Continue reading A Political Who’s Who of Global Warming Liars November 8, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Commentary, Current Events, Energy, Environment, Environmental Issues, Opinion
Leave a comment Energy ABCs: Playing Americans for Fools By Alan Caruba I have long harbored strong doubts about the knowledge that most Americans possess regarding the sources of energy they largely take for granted. We flip a switch and the lights go on. We pull up to the gas pump and drive away. We use machines that are totally dependent on having enough electricity to power entire cities as well as rural communities. Since all successful economies depend on abundant, affordable energy, why is the Congress preparing to pass a cap-and-trade bill, renamed to suggest “clean energy” and “national security” has anything to do with a huge tax on the use of energy by all Americans? There are some fundamental facts about energy in America you need to know. The Congressional Research Service recently released a report on U.S. energy reserves. To begin: The U.S. has 1,321 billion barrels of oil (or barrels of oil equivalent for other sources of energy) when combining its recoverable natural gas, oil and coal reserves. This is oil known to exist and oil estimates in fields as yet untapped. Between Alaska and the continental offshore potential, we could literally be self-sufficient. Continue reading Energy ABC’s: Playing Americans for Fools October 27, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Commentary, Current Events, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Governance, Opinion
Leave a comment How to be a Jerk By Alan Caruba Let us begin with a fact that whole legions of global warming alarmists cannot wish away or hide from public view. The Earth has been cooling since 1998 and it is getting demonstrably cooler almost everywhere in the world. The cooling will continue for decades. So it follows that the best way to be a complete jerk is to have your book, “Climate Cover-Up: The Crusade to Deny Global Warming”, published at the same time that a recent Public Strategies Inc/Politico poll revealed that “Just four percent (4%) ranked climate change as the top issue.” If the congressional election—-next year’s midterms—-were held today the economy would be the top issue (45%), followed by insane government spending (21%) Another survey, one by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, conducted between September 30 and October 4, found that “fewer respondents see global warming as a very serious problem,; 35% say that today, down from 44% in April 2008.” James Hoggan, the cofounder of DeSmogBlog, along with Richard Littlemore are the proud authors of what has to be the silliest book of the year. It actually has a blurb on the back cover from Leonardo DeCaprio, famed actor and, until now, an unknown meteorological savant. Continue reading How to be a Jerk October 24, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Commentary, Congress, Democrat, Energy, Environment, Environmental Issues, Global Warming, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment Taking Away Your Choice By Alan Caruba
I am always amazed at the variety of choice that exists in my local supermarket. There are other supermarkets in the area, but the one I frequent most has lower prices on most items and almost anything you want to purchase allows one to select among several brands available. We Americans may not think much about choice when it comes to what we buy because we have so many choices. It is the mark of a free marketplace where competition determines winners and losers. It says a lot about a society that puts a high premium on freedom. Your government, however, has decided that, in 2012, you can no longer choose to purchase and use Thomas Edison’s iconic invention, the 100 watt incandescent light bulb. By 2014, all such bulbs will be banned from sale. That’s right, they will vanish from the shelves of supermarkets and other outlets. As this is being written, your government is debating taking away your choice to purchase health insurance. Or not. If it gets its way, everyone, old and young, healthy or ill, everyone will have to buy health insurance—most likely the brand issued by the government because it will drive most present insurance companies out of business. That is so un-American as to defy belief. Continue reading Taking Away Your Choice October 22, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Commentary, Current Events, Environment, Environmental Issues, Global Warming, Opinion
Leave a comment Using “Global Warming” to Steal your Rights By Alan Caruba
By now, anyone paying any attention whatever to the weather has begun to notice that it is getting colder earlier in the U.S. and that this is occurring around the world. On www.iceagenow.com, Robert W. Felix, the author of “Not by Fire, but by Ice” and “Magnetic Reversals and Evolutionary Leaps”, reports on current weather events. A recent visit contains these items: Storm now heading for Ireland & Britain predicted 100 days ago Snow likely to follow – 18 Oct 09 Significant snow in Argentina’s Southern Andes – 19 Oct 09 Czech Republic: Most snow in 100 years – 16 Oct 09 Snow across Central and Eastern Europe – 15 Oct 09 Earliest October Snowfall on record in Southern Germany – 15 Oct 09 Why then is a United Nations conference on climate change to be held this December in Copenhagen still claiming that the Earth faces the dreaded “global warming”? Continue reading Using “Global Warming” to Steal your Rights October 20, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Business, Cap and Trade, Commentary, Current Events, Economics, Energy, Environment, Environmental Issues, Global Warming, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment The “Rent Seekers” – Green Corporations By Alan Caruba
In economics, “rent seeking” is a term that describes the process by which corporations, unions, trade groups, and individuals try to gain unfair advantages through politics and lobbying rather than via competitive trade in the free marketplace. Going “Green” has proven to be one of the favorite ways by which corporations position themselves to benefit. “Global warming” and the reduction of “greenhouse gas emissions”, primarily carbon dioxide from various forms of energy use, is the reason given for the hideous “Cap-and-Trade” legislation making its way through Congress. It will enrich some corporations that have rolled the dice on “renewable” energy (solar and wind) and, in particular, the utilities supporting its mandatory system of “carbon credits” to be traded among energy producers and users. Business Week recently took note of the way global warming positions are rather dramatically dividing the business community. Apple became the fifth large member company to resign or reduce its role in the U.S. Chamber of Commerce because of the Chamber’s “aggressive opposition to climate change legislation.” Nike also resigned. The Wall Street Journal reported that Al Gore is a member of the board of Apple and that Apple’s Chief Operating Officer, Tim Cook, “happens to sit on the board of Nike.” The Journal further noted that “Both companies may figure they can afford a U.S. carbon tax because most of their manufacturing is done outside the U.S.” This is a classic example of rent seeking, giving them an advantage over competitors whose manufacturing is U.S.-based in the event they (and the rest of us) have a carbon tax imposed on them. Continue reading The “Rent Seekers” – Green Corporations September 30, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Congress, Current Events, Democrat, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Opinion
Leave a comment Cap-and-Switch: Hello Sucker! By Alan CarubaHere’s a look at the introduction of a draft bill co-sponsored by Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA), co-sponsored by John Kerry (D-MA). It is the Senate alternative to the horrid “Cap-and-Trade” bill authored by Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA). Call it “Cap-and-Switch.” IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES All those who believe Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and the Jolly Green Giant are real should stop reading now. Let’s look at the objectives of the Senate version of a huge tax on all energy use by every American. As I will note later, the bulk of the cost will fall on low-and-middle income households. “To create clean energy jobs.” This is pure bunk. Such jobs would be primarily in the production of solar and wind energy. Other such jobs involve biofuels such as ethanol. Combined, solar and wind represent barely one percent of all the electricity generated daily in the nation. If solar and wind were profitable, you can be sure that American entrepreneurs would have long ago become more active, but if it were not for taxpayer dollars subsidizing solar and wind, neither would likely exist. The only thing ethanol has done has been to raise the cost of the corn from which it is made and reduce the mileage of every gallon of gasoline to which it is added. Continue reading Cap-and-Switch: Hello Sucker! September 26, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Congress, Current Events, Democrat, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Governance, Healthcare, Opinion, Politics
8 comments Liberals are Killing America By Alan Caruba
It is not a new observation, but it is one that needs review and repeating every so often. Why do liberals always seem to get on the side of any issue concerning America’s future? Its sovereignty? Its financial security? Its defense? I think this question is particularly timely given the public discussion of Obamacare that included a huge peaceful protest march on Washington September 12th. The President’s non-stop campaign to get “reform” passed and the heated exchanges in Congress do not represent actual healthcare reform, but are testimony to a liberal obsession with a very bad idea. You know something is desperately wrong when Democrats will not permit the proposed bill to enjoy a grace period of 72 hours during which both the public and members of Congress can actually read it before a vote is taken. The irony of the current battle is that the bill will significantly change Medicare, a program advocated by liberals and, like Social Security, established by Democrats in Congress. It will destroy a free market for insurance programs individuals may choose to purchase. Or not. There is no dispute that both programs, safety nets for Americans, have been helpful. Neither is voluntary There is no doubt that both are insolvent because they are unsustainable. This has been exacerbated by the way Congress has dipped into the funds intended to be set aside for them. Obamacare will end up killing a lot of the people that Medicare was intended to save from the diseases and accidents that afflict the elderly. Continue reading Liberals are Killing America September 25, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Comments & Discussion, Current Events, Energy, Global Warming, Opinion
Leave a comment Making Law, Ignoring Science, Taxing via Ignorance By Alan Caruba
You begin with bad science, the kind that has no basis in fact. You get corporations to promote that bad science in order to increase their profits. Then you get the courts involved to rule on what those corporations are doing and when they incorporate the bad science in their judgment, you complete the circle of ignorance. Somebody always ends up with the bill for this and it is always either the consumer and/or the taxpayer. The process is called “rent seeking” when corporations attempt to manipulate public opinion and policy for their personal gain. Recently, Marlo Lewis, a senior fellow with the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a free market think tank, wrote gleefully about a decision of the Second U.S. Court of Appeals, State of Connecticut et al v. American Power et all, that concluded that states and other plaintiffs have the right to sue five electric utilities for creating a “public nuisance” by emitting carbon dioxide (CO2), thus contributing to global warming. As I am wont to point out almost every day, there is NO global warming and CO2 plays no role whatever in the process by which the Earth warms. It is, however, the most hyped “greenhouse” gas, alleged to be responsible for the planet’s warming. No, the Sun is the most responsible for that and right now it is in hibernation, producing far fewer sunspots (magnetic storms) than in previous years. The result is that the Earth has been cooling for the past decade. September 24, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Comments & Discussion, Current Events, Energy, Global Warming, Governance, Opinion, Politics
2 comments Unbearable Arrogance By Alan Caruba
As the months pass by in the Obama administration, some traits are beginning to emerge that inform us in a general way what we’re up against. To the astonishment of many, it is an administration filled with Marxists. The “Green Jobs” czar Van Jones was exposed as one and resigned. Now it has been revealed that yet another, Mark Lloyd, designated as the “Diversity” czar, holds the Venezuelan dictator, Hugo Chavez, in high esteem, calling his power grab “an incredible revolution.” Even before these two, it was learned that Carol Browner, the “Environmental” czar, was a highly regarded member of the Commission for a Sustainable World Society, which is part of the Socialist International. As various members of the Obama administration expressed their views on events and issues, we discover that they hold most Americans in low esteem. David Axelrod, the communications advisor to President Obama, dismissed an estimated 1.8 million Americans who participated in the September 12 protest march saying, “They’re wrong.” There hasn’t been a comparable event in years, but “They’re wrong.” Continue reading Unbearable Arrogance September 17, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Current Events, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Relations, Governance, Healthcare, Opinion, Politics, The Economy
9 comments Obama: Wrong, Just Wrong By Alan Caruba
What continues to astound me is how wrong the Obama administration is on so many issues. It is not unusual to disagree with some element of the White House agenda, no matter who is president, but I keep looking for something, anything, with which to agree. This is the price Americans who voted for “change” without actually asking or understanding what that change would be are paying. Most, I suspect, were so fixated on any change that did not include George W. Bush that it was no surprise that Obama’s initial answer to every question in the first few weeks of his term was to blame Bush for “the mess” he encountered. The problem with that is that every president leaves his successor “a mess” in some respect. For ten years FDR never successfully figured a way out of the Great Depression until World War II solved that problem. When he died, Harry Truman had to conclude the war in the Pacific and did so with two A-bombs. Then he had to save Europe from Soviet ambitions and get the UN off the ground. When I say “wrong”, I mean that it wasn’t just wrong to try to take over one sixth of the nation’s economy with a grandiose remaking of Medicare, but it was blindly arrogant and stupid. Medicare, heading toward insolvency and riddled with waste, was not the biggest problem to be solved, getting the nation’s financial house in order was. Continue reading Obama: Wrong, Just Wrong September 16, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, African-American, Business, Cap and Trade, Congress, Current Events, Democracy, Economic Crisis, Energy, Environmental Issues, Global Warming, Governance, Healthcare, Opinion, The Economy
2 comments “Technically” We’re Out of a Recession By Alan Caruba
I cannot tell you how relieved I was to hear Ben Bernake, the Chairman of the Federal Reserve, announce that the United States is “technically” out of the recession. I spent much of the day waiting for my phone to ring with offers of work. Chairman Bernake did add that jobs would lag, but all the experts say that jobs always lag and, if that’s the case, I am thinking this time around jobs are not only going to lag, they are going to disappear, run away, and leave much of the work force unable to live the “American dream.” There was a time when the American dream included the opportunity for everyone to own their own home. That dream was based on having a steady job and a decent wage. It was dependent on people saving some of their income for a down payment. It was not dependent on federal government programs that put pressure on banks and mortgage lenders to make loans to people that ACORN had dragged in off the street. I would feel a lot better about Bernake’s announcement if Congress wasn’t right now getting ready to pass a piece of legislation that every single poll says the MAJORITY of Americans do not like and do not want. I speak of course of Obamacare. The same polls also suggest that the more Obama shows up on television giving speeches, being interviewed, and otherwise sucking all the air out of the room, the more a MAJORITY of Americans distrust and dislike him. Continue reading “Technically” We’re Out of a Recession September 15, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Current Events, Energy, Environment, Opinion
Leave a comment Keeping Americans in the Dark By Alan Caruba
After endless speeches and the biggest protest march in recent U.S. history, one would think that the Obama administration would get the message that Americans do not want them or the present Congress to tamper with Medicare other than to eliminate waste. The administration’s top spokesmen, however, professed to know little about the march by nearly two million Americans and, at the same time, to know more about the nation’s healthcare system than those inside it who say there simply are not enough physicians and nurses to meet even today’s needs. Americans have figured out they don’t want Obamacare, but a regime that has its own agenda and intends to impose it on an unwilling public is not interested in the voice of the people. If you think Obamacare is a nightmare or as Rush Limbaugh now calls it “crap legislation”, you have no idea what the Obama gang have in store for you. H.R.2454, the American Clean Energy And Security Act of 2009, barely passed the House in June. It is also known as the Waxman-Markey bill and, most generally, as Cap-and-Trade. It is a monstrosity that everyone, including its sponsors, agree is a massive tax on all energy use. The minute you walk in your home or apartment and turn on the lights, you will feel the impact of this bill. It is currently marinating in the Senate. Continue reading Keeping Americans in the Dark September 13, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Current Events, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Opinion
One comment The Great Copenhagen Liar’s Conference By Alan Caruba
From December 6 through the 18th, a conference sponsored by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change will gather in Copenhagen, Denmark, to explore ways to “prevent global warming” and I would like to be among the first to tell all those idiots checking their passports and deciding what to pack that they can all stay home. This is not an original thought on my part and, in fact, is occasioned by Prof. Henrik Svensmark. He is director of the Center for Sun-Climate Research at the Technical University of Denmark and, not surprisingly, knows a lot about the Sun and climate. Permit me to share some of his thoughts. In a September 9th opinion titled, “While the Sun Sleeps”, Prof. Svensmark wrote, “Last week, the scientific team behind the SOHO (Solar and Heliospheric Observatory) reported that the number of sunspot-free days suggest that solar activity is heading towards its lowest level in about 100 years.” September 3, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Congress, Current Events, Healthcare, Politics
Leave a comment Speak Up, Mr. President, Speak Up! By Alan Caruba
I, for one, am looking forward to President Obama’s address to both houses of Congress. I thought I would have to wait for a State of the Union speech before that happened or, God forbid, that the nation would be attacked as was the case of 9/11. I am looking forward to his televised talk to all of the nation’s school children, too. What gems of wisdom will he share with them? How many potential community organizers will be sitting at their desks, paying attention, and maybe even taking notes? I like it, too, when he sits down for a completely unscripted, informal chat with some network anchor. It would be really neat if he could do things like when, with Zen-like serenity, he swatted a fly. Now, I know there are many who are crying out, “No! No! No!” It has been my observation that the more President Obama speaks, the more his popularity and approval scores drop. By golly, I believe there is a connection! It began when everyone noticed that he never spoke anywhere about anything without his TelePrompters. People began to snicker. Continue reading Speak Up, Mr. President, Speak Up! August 27, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Current Events, Economic Crisis, Energy, Global Warming, Governance, Healthcare, Opinion, Politics
One comment Don’t Just Stand There. Panic! By Alan Caruba
I am rather tired of having to panic every other day courtesy of the U.S. government. It started with seeing the former Secretary of the Treasury sweating profusely while demanding the Congress give him a blank check for $700 billion to bail out some financial institutions that probably should have been allowed to fail. Many were given gobs of taxpayer money to avoid bankruptcy. Others were merged with those that hadn’t been as profligate. In October 1929, Variety, the show business newspaper, had a headline that said “Wall Street Lays an Egg.” What followed was some ten years of a Depression that would not go away because the government did everything possible to prolong it in the name of ending it. The so-called “brain trust” around Franklin D. Roosevelt made every wrong decision available. The Supreme Court had to step in to limit some of the damage at one point. Constitution? What Constitution? About the only thing we are being told is not a cause for panic is the “war on terror”, a phrase that is no longer allowed to be used in official Washington where, apparently, if you don’t call a duck a duck it is no longer a duck. Nonetheless, we are also told that Afghanistan is the “front line” of the war on you-know-what even though there are no “front lines” in insurgencies or guerrilla wars. Continue reading Don’t Just Stand There. Panic! August 25, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Current Events, Governance, Opinion, Politics, Terrorism
Leave a comment Welcome to Obama World By Alan Caruba
There’s the Real World and then there is Obama World. They are like parallel universes that only look alike You can tell them apart because the Real World is full of dangerous and demented people who think they are fulfilling Allah’s command to kill unbelievers or even believers with whom they disagree. It’s a world where suicide is okay so long as you are killing others in the process. In the Real World, there are people who think it’s okay to fly commercial aircraft into the Twin Towers and Pentagon. It’s a world where video tapes of al Qaeda victims being beheaded are the deranged Looney Tunes of the Middle East. And then there is Obama World. It is a world in which the President of the United States must apologize if any terrorists or their supporters were offended when the U.S. drove the Taliban out of Afghanistan and then invaded a nation controlled by a psychopath who had previously invaded Iran and then Kuwait. When not so engaged, Saddam Hussein was content to use poison gas against the Kurds in his nation and to fill his prisons with victims whose fate it was to be raped and executed in the most fiendish ways imaginable. Continue reading Welcome to Obama World August 20, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Congress, Current Events, Democrat, Economic Crisis, Energy, Environment, Healthcare, Opinion, Politics
One comment Signs of Sanity By Alan CarubaI have this theory that nations go crazy from time to time. Collectively they lose their wits or, as is often the case, the people either elect or have imposed on them a complete lunatic, discovering it in slow stages as reports of various horrors make their way to the countryside. These days, those stages are greatly speeded up by the mass media that swiftly spread the word. Unlike the United States, in many nations the news is what the government says is news, but it must also be said that the mainstream media has utterly disgraced itself over the course of the recent campaign and the first months of the Obama administration. There are signs, however, some have rediscovered their role in our society. The most vigorous signs of sanity among the general populace of America have been the recent town hall meetings. The tea parties, too. And just wait for the big march in Washington, D.C. on September 12! That will surely put the fear of the people into the hearts of Congress men and women. It is far better that they fear us than the other way around. Continue reading Signs of Sanity August 19, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Current Events, Democrat, Economic Crisis, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment Mouthpiece By Alan Caruba
“Mouthpiece” is one of those wonderful words that just says it all. As slang, it refers to a lawyer for a mobster, but its more respectable definition is “a person, newspaper, etc., that conveys the opinions or sentiments of others; a spokesperson.” There are many thankless jobs, but surely being the White House spokesperson, the individual who must face the reporters every day to explain policy, make announcements, and respond to criticism of the President, must surely rank high on the list. Bush began with Ari Fleischer, a very skilled and apparently well-liked White House spokesman, but when Fleischer left, he was replaced by Scott McClellen, a man so out of his depth that the occasional missteps of Bush were magnified by his inability to put any kind of spin on them. After he left the office, he wrote a bitter book about the experience, further confirming that he was a weasel. Some, however, were very good at it. I think immediately of Tony Snow who joined the Bush administration at a time when it was under fire for its Iraq policies. Tony dealt with all questions with amazing grace and good spirits. Only cancer could and did get the best of him. Dana Perino stepped in after Snow’s passing and turned out to be a poised and perfect replacement. As they say in the world of sports, a natural. It didn’t hurt that, in a male dominated news corps, she was very easy on the eyes. Continue reading Mouthpiece August 18, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Congress, Current Events, Democrat, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment Cap-and-Trade Insanity By Alan Caruba
To understand how insane the Cap-and-Trade bill really is you need to know that it based on the belief that carbon dioxide emissions must be reduced to avoid a global warming that is NOT happening. The American Clean Energy and Security Act is a giant scam involving “carbon credits” to be sold and traded. It is also about billions in taxpayer’s dollars being wasted on wind and solar generation of electricity. If this was a sensible way to produce energy, it would be a dominant producer, but it isn’t. Short of producing electricity by peddling bicycles, it is as inefficient and impractical as possible. So-called “clean energy” accounts for just over one percent of all the electricity Americans use every day and it exists only because the government subsidizes it by taking your tax dollars and giving them to wind and solar energy producers. Some States require utilities to buy electricity from them. As for “security”, how much energy security does the United States enjoy if it must import 60% of the oil it uses for transportation and a wide range of products, not the least of which is anything made from plastic? Real security means drilling and mining right here, right now. There’s plenty of oil in ANWR and offshore. The government forbids access to it. And, where’s there’s oil there’s natural gas as well. As for coal, the U.S. has enough for centuries of affordable electricity, but the environmental organizations have in recent years stopped the building of a hundred coal-fired plants and they brag about it. Continue reading Cap-and-Trade Insanity August 17, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Advice, Cap and Trade, Current Events, Democrat, Governance, Journalism, Politics
2 comments Watch for the Signs By Alan Caruba
There are some lessons one learns from a life spent first as a journalist and then for many decades as a public relations professional. You cannot succeed in PR if you cannot spot the early signs that the media herd is heading in one direction or the other. It was obvious from the beginning that the mainstream media (MSM) fell in love with Barack Obama. Like Chris Matthews, it was a complete crush. Obama was the anti-Hillary, come to save America from her shrill voice and to redeem our sad history of racism. At this point, however, it is just as obvious that he has managed to say and do any number of things that have aroused the distrust of the all but the 28% of those convinced he is a dandy President. The rest no longer feel that way. The MSM is presently sticking its finger in the wind to find out which way it is blowing. They are checking Rasmussen and Gallup polls. Once they conclude that Obama is unpopular to a point beyond which they can no longer obscure or influence, they will do what all fearless MSM do; they will begin to gang up on him. By the time Jimmy Carter left office, even the Peanut Farmer’s Gazette was glad to see him go. Continue reading Watch for the Signs August 16, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Current Events, Energy, Environmental Issues, Opinion, Politics
One comment The New Dark Ages of Britain & The U.S. By Alan CarubaI have long believed that the environmental movement, particularly in America, is quite literally an internal enemy, no less insidious that the efforts of the former Soviet Union to infiltrate spies and agents of influence our government to affect policy, I know that sounds harsh, but one needs only look at Great Britain where environmentalism has turned that once great nation into a virtual police state where every bizarre and insane environmental policy is culminating in a nation that will soon be experiencing blackouts and brownouts to its entire system of providing electricity. “In the frigid opening days of 2009, Britain’s electricity demand peaked at 59 gigawatts. Just over 45% of that came from power plants fuelled by gas from the North Sea. A further 35% or so came from coal, less than 15% came from nuclear power and the rest from a hotchpotch of other sources.” The problem England faces, according to the August 8th edition of The Economist, is that it will soon be dependent on “Vladimir Putin’s deeply unreliable and corrupt Russia.” This report comes when both the Russians and the Chinese have signed agreements with Cuba, just ninety miles from Florida, to begin to explore and extract its offshore oil. America, however, denies access to 85% of all of its offshore oil and natural gas reserves along its extensive east and west coasts. It further denies access to its huge deposits of coal in its Midwestern States. We import 60% of the oil we consume; much of it comes from Canada, Mexico, and Venezuela. August 13, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Current Events, Democracy, Healthcare, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment Obama: American Demagogue By Alan Caruba
All during the long campaign leading to his election and inauguration, the media kept telling us what a genius Barack Obama was. He was a lecturer on the Constitution at the University of Chicago. He was in the Illinois State legislature. He had graduated from Harvard Law School and, before that, Columbia University. Curiously, throughout all that time, few of his fellow students or faculty had any recall of him. No records from those days exist or are available. He was (and is) a cipher. When you’re the President of the United States, however, everything you say and do is under close examination. Obama must like that part of the job because he has held five prime time press conferences in the first six months, about the same amount as his predecessor held in eight years. Unfortunately for Obama, the number of people tuning in became less and less with each press conference. The last one blew up in his face as he made an offhand remark about the arrest of a friend of his. At a recent town hall meeting to promote his healthcare “reform” plan, he compared it to the U.S. Postal Service, thus inadvertently telling the truth for a change. None of these suggests a finely tuned sense of political reality and, in particular, the introduction of two pieces of legislation, Cap-and-Trade and Healthcare “reform”, that just about everyone hates except some brain-dead Democrats in Congress, now seem a very bad idea and very bad timing. Continue reading Obama: American Demagogue August 11, 2009
Posted by Ben Cerruti in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Current Events, Democracy, Governance, Opinion, Politics
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By Ben Cerruti
He says that he personally, as if a Congress wasn’t involved, will not allow any tax of a family making under $250,000 a year to increase by one dime. He continues to say this despite the fact that both his Treasury Secretary and Director of his National Economic Council have said that such a tax could not be taken off the table. Both of these gentlemen are economists while B.O. has no such education or experience. In addition, the fact that the Cap and Trade bill, if passed, would admittedly increase the cost of everyone utility bills and the bipartisan Congressional Budget Office has indicated that the proposed Health Care bill could not be paid for without more tax revenue further contradicts his rhetoric. To expect that the people will continue to believe he can fulfill this campaign promise is the height of audacity.
The audacity continues when he says about the proposed health care plan that people can keep their present medical insurance if they so desire when Insurance Co’s, unjustly so, are being blamed for the high cost of medical care. In fact, the public option plan is designed to put the medical insurers out of business and lead to a fully nationalized program. Video clips have shown Congressman Barney Franks saying as much and B.O., prior to his election, stating that he favored a single payer plan..Further, he has stated the seniors should not worry about losing their coverage despite the fact the health care plan states that they must accept counseling relating to their final years of life. This is a precursor for government making decisions affecting the necessity of specific health care to prolong one’s life. Decisions that morally should be left up to the individual and their family. Again the Messiah is demonstrating his audacity. Continue reading Audacity of Barack Obama August 7, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Current Events, Energy, Healthcare, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment Seasoned Protesters By Alan Caruba
Have you taken a close look at the protesters showing up at the town hall meetings being held by the horrified members of Congress? These folks are often quite OLD. Unlike the union or ACORN thugs that Democrats use to intimidate attendees, some of those giving their Congressman an ear-full show up in wheelchairs or using walkers. The healthier among them seem quite at ease raising their voices and why is that? Being among that generation, it occurred to me that they are the same people who showed up for the Civil Rights marches and at the Vietnam War protests in Washington, D.C when I was a young man. I was there, too. I saw these folks show up to demand President Nixon resign after the Watergate scandal got too big for him to silence. Many of them–often quite liberal–continued showing up for environmental causes or for a march to find a cure for breast cancer. These are seasoned protesters; often liberal in their youth and just as often now conservative in their older years. This generation of elder protesters has had plenty of practice and now has plenty to protest about. They aren’t a bunch of kids with no knowledge of history. These people lived history! Continue reading Seasoned Protesters August 7, 2009
Posted by Congressman Billybob in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Congress, Current Events, Energy, Environment, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment Column 666, about President Obama by John Armor This is the 666th column in this weekly series. It had to be spent on an overarching subject. So it is. President Barack Obama is the most accomplished liar I have ever encountered, and that includes several pathological liars I faced in court. The best of those I could not rattle even with a well-prepared and vigorous cross-examination. Only the weight of solid facts from other sources served to expose and defeat those people. Pathological liars can give the impression that they are telling the truth because they are smooth, accomplished, and effective. But the most important reason is that they have learned to lie to themselves. When they tell a bald-faced lie, right to your face, they actually believe what they are saying. I’ll use exactly one example. On the campaign trail, Obama repeatedly said that “no one earning less than $250,000 a year will pay any additional taxes.” This was his definition of the middle class, in his universal mantra of no new taxes for the bulk of Americans. Now, two members of his Cabinet on Sunday talk shows, plus tax cheat Charlie Rangel, who yet remains as Chairman of the House Committee that writes the tax laws, have all made the same remark on television in front of God and everybody. That statement was that “tax iucreases on the middle class might be necessary to pay for the President’s health care plan.” Continue reading Column 666, about President Obama August 3, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Current Events, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment Obama’s Big Lie: “Green” Jobs
By Alan Caruba
If there is one thing Americans began to rapidly conclude following his inauguration in January, it is that President Barack Obama lies all the time and that those lies are often blatant. In pursuit of the “Cap-and-Trade” act that is a huge tax on all energy use in America, Obama’s favorite mantra is that massive subsidies to wind and solar energy producers, as well as biofuel producers, will generate millions of new “green” jobs. Perhaps the worst part of this lie is that they will actually destroy jobs. In the July edition of Energy Tribune, Michael Economides and Peter Glover co-authored “Green Jobs: Fast-Tracking Economic Suicide.” I know Economides and he is internationally recognized as one of the world’s authorities on energy issues. “Creating ex nihilo—literally, out of nothing—used to be a theological concept, God’s prerogative. Today, it seems, President Obama and certain Western politicians claim to possess the ability to do it,” write the article’s authors. “Against all the laws of economics and the marketplace, President Obama and others believe they can create millions of ‘green’ jobs ex nihilo, literally out of thin air, via cap and trade.” Continue reading Obama’s Big Lie: “Green” Jobs August 1, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Congress, Current Events, Energy, Governance, Healthcare, Opinion
Leave a comment The Perfect Storm By Alan Caruba
The term, ‘”the perfect storm”, has come to mean how circumstances and bad judgments come together to create havoc and death. I have begun to conclude that America is caught in a perfect storm. It didn’t occur overnight, but it has rapidly reached a point wherein the very life of the nation is at stake. The tipping point, if I may be permitted another cliché, was the election of Barack Hussein Obama as President. Though efforts, including several books, attempted to flesh out what little was actually known about Obama, it was the skillful packaging that turned him into a rock star whose theme “hope and change” could and did mean anything the voter imagined. Obama arrived in the Oval Office with virtually no paper trail. He had not ever managed a business, never made a payroll, and had not worked in the private sector. He had been “a community organizer” and had taught constitutional law as a lecturer at the University of Chicago. In this regard, he was spectacularly ill-prepared to make decisions regarding the greatest economy in the history of civilization. He had been preceded by a Congress controlled by the Democrat Party as of the 2006 midterm elections as voters wearied of the long war in Iraq and, typically, the second term of then-President Bush. Leading the new Congress was, by any standard one could apply, two of the most stupid politicians to hold high office. Sen. Harry Reid (NV) was Senate Majority Leader and Rep. Nancy Pelosi (CA) was Speaker of the House. Continue reading The Perfect Storm July 29, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Congress, Current Events, Energy, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment Congress Says NO to Energy By Alan Caruba
Americans are seriously worried over the rising number of their fellow citizens without jobs.
Americans watch the daily cost of a gallon of gasoline as closely as sports scores. America has so much untapped oil that it boggles the imagination. Much of it is located offshore of the nation’s coastline. Some states benefit greatly from the oil and natural gas extracted from the Gulf of Mexico. Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas receive revenues collected by the federal government for offshore production and of course there are lots of jobs involved. July marked a year since the lifting of an 18-year-old presidential moratorium (ban) on offshore exploration and drilling for oil and natural gas, but a de facto ban continues for states from Maine to Florida, Washington to California. In Alaska, a federal ban on extracting oil in ANWR makes a joke out of politicians who call for “energy independence.” Nine out of ten wells in America’s interior are produced by small, independent producers, not the so-called Big Oil companies. They increase the nation’s energy security and expand domestic energy production. They reduce U.S. dependence on imported oil. Continue reading Congress Says NO to Energy July 23, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Current Events, Energy, Global Warming, Opinion
Leave a comment Green Desperation By Alan Caruba
The environmental movement and, in particular, “global warming”, has become a joke. That is always a sign of decline. Unless you’re a comedian, when people start laughing at you it’s never a good thing. There are often defining moments in the death of a movement and I think I may have spotted one when the Australian July issue of Rolling Stone featured a naked Miranda Kerr on its “Green Issue” cover, chained to a tree while demurely covering her naughty parts to advance the cause of koala bears. Ms. Kerr is described as a “super model” and terribly concerned that there are only 100,000 koalas left. Apparently, “global warming” has something to do with that. If you have to use nudity to sell your nonsense, you are scrapping bottom; People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals does it all the time. Back in the U.S. one of the biggest idiots in the U.S. Senate, a former candidate for President, John Kerry, had convened a hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee which predicted that “massive crop devastation, melting glaciers, water shortages, (and) millions of displaced people…will drag the U.S. military into conflict if global climate change goes unchecked.” Observers may have noticed that Greens no longer refer to “global warming” much anymore as opposed to “climate change.” This is because (a) there is NO global warming and (b) the climate has always been in a process of change over the past 4.5 billion years. If you wanted to ensure that the U.S. military continued to receive billions for defense, claiming that “rising sea levels” will lead to conflicts is a pretty silly way of justifying it, given the threats to peace in the Middle East and elsewhere. Continue reading Green Desperation July 14, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Current Events, Energy, Environmental Issues, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment The Horrid Dr. Holdren By Alan Caruba
England had “Mad King George” who was probably bipolar and eventually went completely insane around 1810. It would take another ten years before his suffering ended and he passed away, but his powers had passed to the Prince of Wales by then. In those days they knew when people were crazy and even provided an asylum from which we get the word “bedlam.” As the days and week go by, they might as well post a sign outside of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue where our President conducts the affairs of state. It should simply say, “Welcome to Bedlam.” One example of the kind of dangerous insanity circulating like swamp gas around the White House is Dr. John P. Holdren, Obama’s science advisor. He is so nuts that even The New York Times reporter, John Tierney, asked “Does being spectacularly wrong about a major issue in your field of expertise hurt your chances of becoming the presidential science advisor?” When Bjorn Lomborg published “The Skeptical Environmentalist”, Holdren joined in an attack published in Scientific American that The Economist called “strong on contempt and sneering, but weak on substance.” Continue reading The Horrid Dr. Holdren July 12, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Congress, Current Events, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment The U.S. Weather Service Says… By Alan Caruba
Below is a recent post by the U.S. Weather Service. I have added some boldface to elements of the text.
· Due to the unusually cool and wet conditions in June…here are some interesting facts to note:
· This June is tied for the 8th coolest on record. The average temperature was 67.5. (That’s) 3.7 degrees below normal…which also occurred in 1897.
· This was the coolest June since 1958…when the average temperature as 67.2 degrees.
· Below average temperatures occurred on 23 out of 30 days this June…or 75 percent of the month
· Central Park has not hit 90 degrees in the month of June this year. The last time this occurred was back in 1996.
· Central Park has not hit 85 degrees in the month of June this year. The last time this occurred was back in 1916. This has only occurred two other times…1903 and 1886.
· The low temperature dipped below 60 degrees eleven times in the month of June. The last time this occurred was in 2003 when it occurred seventeen times.
· It was the second wettest June on record with 10.06 inches of rain. The wettest June on record is 2003 with 10.27 inches. Continue reading The U.S. Weather Service Says…
July 7, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Congress, Current Events, Democracy, Democrat, Economic Crisis, Opinion, Politics, The Media
Leave a comment The “Secret” Tea Party Protests By Alan Caruba
An estimated 2,000 “Tea Party” nationwide protests against excessive taxation did not get much coverage in the nation’s mainstream media. You had to visit World Net Daily to get the story. According to WND, between 3,000 and 4,000 gathered in San Antonio while more than 2,000 gathered in Marietta, Georgia. There were a reported 1,500 in Louisville, Kentucky, and 1,500 in Olympia, Washington. In Reno, 3,000 showed up. If you Googled for “Tea Party” on July 5th, the day after the many events scheduled for Independence Day, you would come up empty except for a brief story in the Newark, NJ Star-Ledger, “Thousands take part in ‘tea party’ protest against high taxes in Morristown.” While the Star-Ledger deserves credit for its coverage it was a tad short on its tally of those held in New Jersey, calling it “more of more than a dozen.” According to the Tea Party website, there were 37 such events in New Jersey planned for the day. Many states had comparable numbers. With the exception of a few local Associated Press stories there was, in effect, a news blackout of coverage turning the tea parties into the equivalent of secret events. Watching television news throughout the Fourth, one would scarcely have been aware of them. Continue reading The “Secret” Tea Party Protests July 5, 2009
Posted by Author 101 in: Advice, Attitude, Business, Business Management, Cap and Trade, Economic Crisis, Economics, Education, Finance, General Topics, Habit Change, Inspiration & Motivation, Internet Advice, Interview, Lifestyle, Literature, Marketing, Men's Issues, Motivation, Self-Help, Social Aspects, Social Issues, The Economy, Uncategorized, Website Instructions, Women's Perspective, Working Women
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No, we won’t begin with “Do you have a master’s degree?” Although education does matter, higher education is not a requirement for starting or succeeding in a new business. In fact, according to a 1992 United States Census Bureau report, only 5.3 percent of business owners have a Master’s degree or higher education. 9.4 percent had less than a high school education—some only up to the eighth grade. Oddly enough, only 17 percent had any business education. The founder of Dell Computers was a college dropout. Starting out of his garage, he managed to excel above all of the world’s top computer manufacturers. One in three computers sold today is a Dell. July 3, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Current Events, Democrat, Economic Crisis, Energy, Environment, Foreign Affairs, Geopolitical Events, Governance, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment Making Bush Look Good
By Alan Caruba
It’s taken barely half a year to make George W. Bush look good to a lot of Americans who experienced “Bush Derangement Syndrome” or, like myself, were critical of several of his policies while President. I imagine Bush watching the evening news these days and just laughing as he watches Obama just “step in it” every time he encounters the same or some new problem with which Bush dealt. And, of course, there’s the Iraq War which followed his payback for 9/11 during which he chased al Qaeda and the Taliban out of Afghanistan. The Iraq War began in 2003 and lasted six years to the point where we are drawing down forces or at least moving them out of the major cities to see if the Iraqis themselves can provide security. A lot of the problems with the conduct of the Iraq War can be traced to Donald Rumsfeld, the former Secretary of Defense who just flat-out got it wrong too many times. On paper Rumsfeld had terrific credentials, but either he was terribly advised by his generals or he didn’t pay them proper attention or both. Wars cannot be fought “on the cheap” or won with too few troops. Continue reading Making Bush Look Good June 30, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, China, Congress, Current Events, Democrat, Education, Energy, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment America, the Silly Nation By Alan Caruba
As we prepare to celebrate Independence Day, we will hear about our Founding Fathers, about those who fought our wars to preserve and safeguard our nation, and other men and women who contributed to the nation’s greatness. It is good to look back, but future generations will look back as well and wonder how such a great nation became such a silly nation, the object of scorn and ridicule around the world, challenged by every gangster nation that shares the planet; attacked by Al Qaeda, threatened by North Korea, mocked by Venezuela, insulted by Iran, and sustained by the wealth of China and other lenders. What other republic is governed by fools who voted without reading “climate” legislation whose 1,200 pages of rules and regulations will enrich a few and leave the rest scrambling to pay the light bill? That is, if the light turns on. If passed by the Senate, it will be the largest tax increase in the history of the nation. It exists to “save the planet” from a “global warming” that is not happening. What other nation would systematically ensure that its vast resources of coal, enough to power plants to produce electricity for the next hundred or two hundred years, not be used because no new plants will be built? Fully fifty percent of our electricity comes from coal, but this nation is about to waste billions of dollars on wind and solar energy—so called “clean” energy—which accounts for about one percent. Continue reading America, the Silly Nation June 29, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Congress, Current Events, Democrat, Energy, Global Warming, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment The Lying EPA By Alan Caruba
June 26, 2009, Investor’s Business Daily “A suppressed EPA study says old U.N. data ignore the decline in global temperatures and other inconvenient truths. Was the report kept under wraps to influence the vote on the cap-and-trade bill? “This was supposed to be the most transparent administration ever. Yet as the House of Representatives prepared to vote on the Waxman-Markey bill, the largest increase in U.S. history on 100% of Americans, an attempt was made to suppress a study shredding supporter’ arguments. “On Friday, the day of the vote, the Competitive Enterprise Institute said was releasing ‘an internal study on climate science that was suppressed by the Environmental Protection Agency.’” You can read the EPA document at June 28, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Congress, Current Events, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Opinion
One comment Betrayed by Congress By Alan CarubaMark it on your calendar, June 26, 2009 was the date that the House of Representatives betrayed every American in the name of saving the nation and the Earth from global warming. It was the day that 219 Representatives voted for the obscenely misnamed “American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009.” Only eight Republican members of the House voted for it and 44 Democrats voted against it. The bill, some 1,200 pages, was not read by those men and women voting on it because they were not permitted the time to do so or have their staffs do it. The co-author of the bill, Rep. Henry Waxman, admitted that even he did not know its full contents. The vote was not based on science, on economics, or simple common sense. It was an exercise in raw political power exercised by the Speaker of the House and her minions. Continue reading Betrayed by Congress June 25, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Current Events, Environment, Environmental Issues, Global Warming, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment Save the Earth! Get Rid of Your Refrigerator! By Alan Caruba
On June 22, Greenpeace USA put out the word that “A new study published today in the Proceeding of the National Academy of Sciences shows that refrigerant chemicals, so called F-gases, are a more dangerous global warming threat than previously predicted.”
Apparently, in order to save the Earth, we must all unplug and get rid of our refrigerators and air conditioners. The study was authored by scientists from the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency, the United States government agencies, NOAA and EPA, along with a scientist from “the chemical company Dupont.” You don’t suppose that Dupont has come up with a new refrigerant that it would like to sell, do you? As to anything NOAA and the EPA has to say about the environment, at this point anyone older than a kindergartner knows that virtually everything these agencies say about global warming is pure fiction. They long ago abandoned any pretence about offering science-based information on anything. Continue reading Save the Earth! Get Rid of Your Refrigerator! June 24, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Congress, Current Events, Democrat, Energy, Global Warming, Governance, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment Cap-and-Trade Bill: Villainy on a Grand Scale By Alan Caruba
Supported by outright lies by the President about “clean” or “renewable energy”, and based on the greatest hoax of the modern era, “global warming”, on Friday Congress is reportedly going to vote on the 1,200-page Waxman-Markey “Cap and Trade” bill (H.R. 2454). It would impose a huge tax on the provision and use of electricity in the nation. Energy is the most vital resource America has and we have enjoyed abundant and affordable energy for our long history. That will all change if the Waxman-Markey bill becomes law. There is no “global warming.” The Earth is presently ten years into a cooling cycle and it is predicted to last a very long time. Calling carbon dioxide “a pollutant” is a lie. All vegetation on Earth is dependent on carbon dioxide. Putting Limits on carbon dioxide emissions is idiocy and lunacy. Continue reading Cap-and-Trade Bill: Villainy on a Grand Scale June 21, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Current Events, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Relations, Islam, Opinion, Politics
One comment From Jimmy Carter to Barack Obama: A Horror Story By Alan CarubaJohn F. Kennedy, standing in front of the Berlin Wall, said “Ich bin en Berliner” to declare his solidarity with Western Germany, divided from its eastern half by the compromises with the Soviet Union at the end of World War II. Ronald Reagan would later demand, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall” as well as declare his solidarity with the Polish people seeking to free themselves from Soviet domination. I have heard two versions of what President Obama has done in response to the Iranian uprising. One says that he was right to keep a low profile so that the United States would not be blamed for the rebellion against the tyrannical ayatollahs. This, it’s said provides “deniability” in the event the regime successfully puts down the rebellion. The other version says he should be outspoken in his support for the Iranian people. History will decide whether President Obama has chosen the right course of action, but we know he has already made major efforts to reach out to the “Supreme Leader” and his mullah cronies. Death to the U.S. and Israel has always been the rallying call for the thirty-year-old Islamic revolution. We are the external enemies by which the mullahs assert their right to run Iran. At the same time, by distancing himself from the Israelis, President Obama has let the whole of the Middle East know he has cast his vote for Islam. Continue reading From Jimmy Carter to Barack Obama: A Horror Story June 18, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Cap and Trade, Current Events, Democracy, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment Reasons to Distrust Your Government
By Alan Caruba
In the normal course of events, when voters no longer have confidence in the President, their Senators and their Representatives, they vote them out of office, but there are whole agencies of government that continue on no matter who is in office and, since their budgets and existence depend on the politics of whoever holds power, they bend to serve their policies. A democracy is most in peril when citizens conclude they can no longer trust their government and there is no better example of that than a recent report, “Global Climate Change Impacts in the United States”, issued by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. It is sheer rubbish. It is typical of the deliberate distortions and outright lies that have been put forth to an increasingly doubting public regarding “global warming.” It is part and parcel of the deceptions perpetrated for decades now by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, all of which feature tortured data of dubious quality and, since 1998, have ignored the Earth’s cooling trend. The increasing reports from around the nation of “freaky” weather, of snow in June, and other anomalies are, in fact, a reflection of this cooling trend and it is likely to last at least thirty years or more. John P. Holdren, Assistant to the President on Science and Technology, and a man who holds some of the most outlandish and baseless views on climate change, said “This new report integrates the most up-to-date scientific findings into a comprehensive picture of ongoing as well as expected future impacts of heat-trapping pollution on the climate experience of Americans, region by region and sector by sector.” Continue reading Reasons to Distrust Your Government June 12, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Congress, Current Events, Democrat, Economics, Governance, Opinion, Politics
Leave a comment Obama has Lost his Mojo By Alan Caruba
The hours and the days speed by. It is almost five months since President Obama was sworn in. A million people gathered in Washington on a bitterly cold day to hear him and to leave behind a mountain of trash. Granted that in the weeks leading up to the inauguration, first the White House and then the Congress panicked in the face of what looked like a total Wall Street meltdown. A frantic effort was made to secure a blank check for billions to purchase the “toxic” paper, the bundled mortgages that turned out to have no identifiable assets. Major banks, investment houses, and a huge, international insurance company tottered on the brink of failure. Some did. Some were merged. Americans, even the most unsophisticated, understood that such an implosion threatened the financial bedrock of the nation, but first the Bush administration and then the Obama administration said that such steps must be taken. Congress went along because they had no choice. They did have a choice; indeed, a range of choices. Continue reading Obama has Lost his Mojo June 9, 2009
Posted by Alan Caruba in: Accountability, Cap and Trade, Current Events, Democrat, Economic Crisis, Environment, Opinion
One comment Taxing Cows
By Alan Caruba
Just how crazed is the Environmental Protection Agency? When I say “crazed”, I mean just how far out of touch with reality, with science, with the economy, with common sense, and with the American people is the EPA? Ever since the Supreme Court made one of the greatest blunders since the Dred Scott case, declaring carbon dioxide (CO2) a “pollutant” that could be regulated by the EPA, that deranged agency has been pushing a tax on CO2 emissions from cows, pigs, and other farm animals on which we depend for milk and meat at the local supermarket. According to Encarta, in 2005 there were an estimated 95,848,000 cows in the United States. Presumably, there are comparable numbers of pigs, goats, and other critters that emit belches and farts sufficient to destroy the Earth with the CO2 they emit. Nor should we overlook the six pounds of CO2 that the 307 million Americans exhale daily. Continue reading Taxing Cows |
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Obama Asks America to Commit Suicide
Obama Asks America to Commit Suicide
By Alan Caruba
President Obama is one of the most articulate we have had in that office. His ability to deliver a speech or a short talk such as his first from the Oval Office Tuesday evening is impressive. He knows how to deliver an address.
What he doesn’t know or doesn’t care about is the difference between the truth and a lie.
His fifteen-minute address was the piling on of one lie after another regarding America’s use of energy and its needs for the future. Continue reading Obama Asks America to Commit Suicide