Nanny State Wins: Light Bulb Ban Repeal Fails in House

July 18, 2011 | Filed Under Budget, Business, Climate Change, Congress, Constitution, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Energy, Environment, EPA, Global Warming, GOP, Government, Government, Corruption, House of Representatives, Liberals, Nanny State, Republicans, Warner Todd Huston | Comments Off

-By Warner Todd Huston

If the House Republicans can’t even get rid of one of the most odious examples of nanny statism in the age of Obama, what exactly are they worth? On Tuesday, Rep. Joe Barton (R, Texas) failed in his effort to repeal the incandescent light bulb ban idiotically signed into law by Nanny G.W. Bush.

Barton failed with his The Better Use of Light Bulbs (BULB) Act (HR 2417)on a 233-193 vote. A two-thirds majority was needed for passage.

Only five Democrats crossed ideological lines to vote in favor of the bill to repeal the idiotic light bulb ban. Worse, ten Republicans joined the Democrats.
Read more

The Greens Just Love Us to Death

July 13, 2011 | Filed Under Al Gore, Alan Caruba, Anti-Americanism, Barbara Boxer, Budget, Business, Cap and Trade, Capitalism, Climate Change, Coal, Congress, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Electric, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Liberals, Natural Gas, Nuclear Power, Oil, President, Taxes | Comments Off

-By Alan Caruba

The vote to end the $6 billion in subsidies to ethanol producers reminded me how much Greens love us all. Surely only love could inspire taking corn and turning it into moonshine, and then mixing it with gasoline. The result caused food riots in far off nations while raising the cost of a gallon of gas every time we fill up at the pump. The ethanol mandates actually reduced the mileage a gallon will provide.

At some point, even the Greens grew disenchanted with ethanol and signaled their permission to end this costly boondoggle to our fearless leaders in Washington, D.C.

You may recall they got off to a strong start when the Environmental Protection Agency was established in 1970. Its first act was to ban DDT and the result of that has been the needless death of millions who could and should have been protected against malaria. The nation these days is experiencing a bed bug population explosion that could be stopped in six months if the EPA would only authorize a pesticide to kill the critters. They won’t.
Read more

Will a Lloyd Dobler Economy Save Us?

June 4, 2011 | Filed Under Barack Obama, Budget, Business, Cap and Trade, Capitalism, Climate Change, Coal, Congress, Democrats/Leftists, Electric, Energy, Environment, EPA, Global Warming, GOP, Government, Government, Corruption, House of Representatives, Liberals, Nuclear Power, Oil, Regulation, Republicans, Senate, Taxes, Warner Todd Huston | Comments Off

-By Beth Shaw

Will a Lloyd Dobler economy save us? That’s the question being asked around the internet today and we can surely expect more of that sort of question as we are seeing more and more headlines of looming economic disaster, both nationally and globally.

What is getting in the way of the United States creating, building, producing and hiring?
Read more

Tying One On: ‘Green Ribbon Schools’ Defy Sobriety

June 4, 2011 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Children, Climate Change, Daniel Clark, Democrats/Leftists, Education, Environment, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Home Schooling, Liberals, Nanny State | Comments Off

-By Daniel Clark

Our federal Department of Education has got a lot to worry about, if it chooses to do so. American students now rank only 48th in math and science, according to the latest survey by the World Economic Forum. History textbooks are riddled with factual errors. Language skills, already suffering from decades of rot under “whole language” theory, must now contend with the corrosive influences of text messaging and social media.

High school education has grown so insufficient that remedial courses are now taught at many universities. Public schools are often unsafe, as well as ineffective, prompting parents to try to help their children escape with the help of school vouchers. Home schooling has become an attractive option to more and more people, who have generally produced superior academic performances to those of the government schools.

So what’s a man like Education Secretary Arne Duncan to do? Why, initiate a “Green Ribbon Schools” project “to recognize schools that are creating healthy and sustainable learning environments and teaching environmental literacy,” of course.
Read more

Green Policies a Substitute For Anti-Capitalist, Anti-American Ideas

May 28, 2011 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Budget, Business, Cap and Trade, Capitalism, Climate Change, Communism, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Environment, Free Trade, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Journalism, Liberals, Media, Media Bias, Regulation, Socialism, Taxes, Warner Todd Huston | Comments Off

-By Warner Todd Huston

Those anti-capitalist college professor types that used to sneer at America and supported the murderous antics of the Soviets had for a short time after the fall of the U.S.S.R. no place in which to invest their anti-American ideals. However, it is clear that they have found a new home: greenism. And so, the old left is the new left again, re-born and hiding behind climate change, mythic green energy, and environmental extremism all acting the surrogate for their failed communist-styled ideas.

One of the latest examples of this surrogacy is indulged by the University of Maryland’s Gar Alperovitz with a piece in The Nation entitled “The New-Economy Movement.”

In this piece, Alperovitz not only openly admits that the so-called “new economy” thinking is simply today’s dumping grounds for ages old, communist philosophy — evinced in buzz words like social justice, egalitarianism, and sustainable communities — he claims they will never be satisfied and that as time moves on, the demands of these enviro-centric economic theories will grow “much more radical.”
Read more

Children’s Book Publisher Collapses to Radical Environmentalist Pressure

May 19, 2011 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Budget, Cap and Trade, Capitalism, Children, Climate Change, Coal, Democrats/Leftists, Education, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Government, Liberals, Nuclear Power, Oil, Taxes, Warner Todd Huston | 2 Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

Extremist environmentalists have won yet another victory for propagandizing our children in schools by forcing Scholastic Books to junk a proposed energy-themed classroom education packet that treated the subject in a more even handed mode in favor of a program that only pushes extremist enviro policies. Yes, once again, the hard-core, anti-capitalist left has won a victory to control what our kids are taught in our schools.

As we learn from Commentary Magazine, Scholastic’s energy program has been under attack from the far left for weeks. Mother Jones Magazine, The New York Times, Greenpeace, the Sierra Club, and the group aptly named “Treehugger” have been attacking the children’s book publisher to force them to jettison the proposed series because Scholastic had authored the program in partnership with the American Coal Foundation.

The 4th grade lesson program was built on a larger look at America’s energy products including coal, oil, natural gas and nuclear power along with the so-called green energies of wind and solar power. But the inclusion of traditional (and technologically possible) forms of energy like coal, oil, natural gas and nuclear was enough to send the heads of the radical enviro-wacko’s heads spinning.
Read more

Greenpeace Admits Coal Power a Job Creator

April 22, 2011 | Filed Under Business, Cap and Trade, Capitalism, Climate Change, Coal, Communism, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Energy, Environment, Free Trade, Global Warming, Government, Liberals, North Carolina, Socialism, Taxes, Warner Todd Huston | Comments Off

-By Warner Todd Huston

Recently the enviro-centric group Greenpeace issued an extensive report scolding the “dirty” energy choices made by tech giants like Apple, Google, and Facebook. Greenpeace is all exercised over the fact that many of these companies have moved to North Carolina to take advantage of the coal-produced energy there because the costs are cheaper than the power in other regions. Amusingly, Greenpeace seemed to have completely missed the fact that coal obviously creates jobs or all these companies wouldn’t be moving to North Carolina in the first place.

Greenpeace has its nose out of joint because Google, Facebook, and Apple have moved data centers to NC to take advantage of “low-cost energy” that it claims produces a “corresponding lack of commitment to clean energy.” The eco group is aghast that “misplaced tax incentives” bring jobs and economic success to rural North Carolina.

All that capitalism is horrible, I suppose.
Read more

Earth Day and Environmental Insanity

April 22, 2011 | Filed Under Africa, Alan Caruba, Anti-Americanism, Budget, Cap and Trade, Climate Change, Coal, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Energy, Environment, EU, Europe, Global Warming, Government, Corruption, Islamofascism, Japan, Liberals, Nuclear Power, Oil, PCism, Science, Society/Culture, Taxes, Terrorism, UN, War on Terror, Western Civilization | Comments Off

-By Alan Caruba

Anyone who has been paying any attention to the environmental movement has got to have concluded it is insane.

While the United States stands poised on defaulting on its ever-growing debt — the highest in the nation’s history;
While wars and insurrections are waged in the Middle East, across northern Africa, and in the Ivory Coast;
While Japan struggles to deal with a major earthquake and nuclear plant meltdown;
While Islam wages terrorism worldwide, and
While European nations attempt to deal with their own financial crisis, the environmentalists — Greens — engage in the most absurd frauds and nonsense since the Dark Ages.

In news from the United Nations — a misnomer if ever there was one — Bolivia is proposing a UN treaty that will give “Mother Earth” the same rights as accorded to human beings. It has just passed a domestic law that grants these rights to bugs, trees, and all other natural things in its own country.

According to the Bolivian proposal, humans have sought to “dominate and exploit” the Earth in ways that threaten the “well-being and existence of many beings” such as malaria-bearing mosquitoes, lice and ticks that spread disease, trees that provide timber for shelter and countless other uses, venomous snakes, and every other creature upon which we depend for food—beef, chickens, and fish, to name just three.
Read more

The Sad Tale of 50 Million Global Warming Refugees

April 15, 2011 | Filed Under Budget, Capitalism, Climate Change, Democrats/Leftists, Environment, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Liberals, Taxes, UN, Warner Todd Huston | Comments Off

-By Warner Todd Huston

This is the sad, sad tale of the 50 million global warming refugees that the UN warned us about. Oh, it isn’t sad because there are any 50 million refugees, it’s sad because people believed that there were going to be 50,000 refugees due to global warming. After all, these purported refugees never materialized.

Back in 2005 the U.N. had determined that by 2010 there would be some 50 million refugees thrown out of their homes because of the ravages of globaloney. As Aaron Worthington says, that prediction came up short of the mark “by only around 50 million.” When the UN was at the height of its great global warming scam, the United Nations Environment Programme predicted that by 2010 there would be 50 million people driven from their homes as a result of globaloney…

Read the rest at RightPundits.com.

Anti-Population Zealots Condemning the Human Race to Extinction

April 3, 2011 | Filed Under Abortion, Global Warming, Kevin Roeten, Planned Parenthood, UN | Comments Off

-By Kevin Roeten

The ‘left’ must be shaking in their boots to see the latest trends of the pro-life juggernaut. More and more people consider themselves pro-life, and favor more restrictions on abortion. The lean towards being pro-life is growing, especially with the young adult.

They understand babies begin sometime, and realize the most obvious answer is at conception. Men, especially, know if they’re in the woods hunting deer and they hear something, prudence dictates to wait and make sure it’s a deer. But it’s already known to be a baby if a woman’s pregnant.

The now commonplace practices of birth control, abortifacient use, late-term abortion (all 3 can be abortion), same-sex marriage, and sterilization were not typically thought of 100 years ago.

With birth control, the uterus is always made inhospitable for implantation, whether the fertilized embryo comes for a visit or not. If the fertilized embryo does visit, it usually can’t implant and is aborted. With same-sex marriage and sterilization, there’s only one purpose–and it’s not population generation.
Read more

Global Warming, R.I.P.

March 20, 2011 | Filed Under Alan Caruba, Climate Change, Environment, Global Warming, Science | Comments Off

-By Alan Caruba

Have you noticed that you rarely hear “global warming” mentioned on radio or television and the term rarely occurs any more in the print media?

One reason is that it has been replaced with “climate change” and the other reason is that the only people talking about climate change seem to be leaders of governments like the United States or Australia.

To borrow a line from Shakespeare, I come to bury global warming, not to praise it.

An early and unrelenting skeptic from the days it first debuted in the late 1980s, I rather instinctively knew that the only warming occurring was the same natural warming that always follows a cooling cycle; in this case the warming that began in 1850 after the Little Ice Age that began around 1300.

It never made sense to me that “industry” should be blamed for pumping massive amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere when the amount of CO2 was a minuscule 0.038 percent with far greater amounts of hydrogen and oxygen that protect the Earth from becoming the galactic equivalent of a toasted marshmallow.
Read more

First Obamacare Waivers Now EPA Rules Waivers

February 3, 2011 | Filed Under Barack Obama, Budget, Business, Cap and Trade, Capitalism, Climate Change, Coal, Democrats/Leftists, Energy, Environment, EPA, Free Trade, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Jobs, Liberals, Nuclear Power, Oil, President, Regulation, Taxes, Warner Todd Huston | 3 Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

The Obama Administration is quickly becoming the most corrupt administration in American history. Recently we reported about the mounting number of waivers that Obama is giving his union pals and union supporters so that they can get away from having to suffer under his Obamacare law and now the president’s jobs-killing greenhouse gas rules levied upon the nation using his fiat EPA powers are also being set aside for his best buddies. Naturally, all those getting these big waivers were big donors to Obama’s campaign.

At this point we are up to over 700 Obamacare waivers given to his union pals and other campaign donors and now the EPA has announced the first waiver for the new greenhouse gas rules that really haven’t even been implemented exactly yet.

Timothy Carney reports that General Electric has been the lucky, lucky recipient of a waiver for Obama’s EPA rules. Yes, very lucky, indeed.
Read more

Humans! Get Over Yourself!

January 9, 2011 | Filed Under Alan Caruba, Cap and Trade, Climate Change, Environment, Global Warming | Comments Off

-By Alan Caruba

The greatest absurdity has been the belief that human beings have any influence over the planet on which they live.

The Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the fifth largest of the Solar System’s four terrestrial planets. It is the only planet that sustains life as we know it and humans came late to the party.

The Earth is dated to be 4.5 billion years old in a universe that is increasingly believed to have always existed, despite the Big Bang theory. Such evidence as exists suggests it is the only planet that has given rise to the evolution of life from self-replicating molecules, starting around 4 billion years ago.

Scientists have given names to the various periods of time of the Earth’s existence. These include the oldest, the Devonian, followed by the Silurian, Ordovician, Cambrian, Paleocene, Cretaceous, Jurassic, and Permian among others.
Read more

Another Losing Republican Scolds the Nation For Firing Him

January 3, 2011 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Budget, Cap and Trade, Congress, Constitution, Democrats/Leftists, Elections, Environment, Global Warming, GOP, Government, Government, Corruption, House of Representatives, Law, Liberals, Republicans, South Carolina, Taxes, Tea Party, Warner Todd Huston | 2 Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

Outgoing Republican Representative from South Carolina Bob Inglis is not going off into forced retirement quietly. No, Ol’ Bobby wants us all to know that the nation has failed him. He and his soft-spinned, middle of the road, week-kneed sort of Republican has been roughly handled by real conservatives and its just not fair, apparently.

You see, quite despite what the voters all across the country said last November — not to mention his own constituents — we were all just too stupid to understand that his sort of “credible conservative” is what’s really needed today and he insists that he’s the man that can bring real Republican ideas to Washington. Too bad the voters in his district disagreed with Mr. Hard loser.
Read more

As Japan Abandons Emissions Caps, Obama Rushes Headlong Toward It

January 1, 2011 | Filed Under Barack Obama, Budget, Business, Cap and Trade, Capitalism, Climate Change, Coal, Congress, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Energy, Environment, EPA, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Japan, Jobs, Law, Liberals, Nuclear Power, Oil, President, Regulation, Republicans, Taxes, Unemployment, Warner Todd Huston | 1 Comment

-By Warner Todd Huston

Even as the Japanese have abandoned its national emissions trading scheme because they’ve realized how many jobs would be lost as a result of the draconian regulations involved, President Obama continues to claim that he wants to impose similar jobs-killing regulations on America.

Japan initially announced that its national carbon trading scheme was to have been approved in the now concluding parliamentary session. But common sense and business interests have delayed the bill until the next session begins in January putting the future of the law into question.

Japan’s National Strategy Minister, Koichiro Gemba, who was appointed to review the government’s core green policy steps, said the trading scheme needed further careful study, indicating that it had effectively been shelved.

Japanese authorities are coming to realize that the emissions cuts that the island nation had imagined it would achieve will cost jobs and severely hamper their business sector. Stark realizations are dawning on the Japanese that emissions goals would be “nearly impossible to meet” without deep cuts in emissions by manufacturers, the power infrastructure, not to mention homes and business buildings.
Read more

The Village of Palatine Passes Its Own Cap and Trade Ordinance – Part 2

December 21, 2010 | Filed Under Budget, Cap and Trade, Chicago, Climate Change, Cook County, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Illinois, Illinois State Government, Liberals, Nanny State, Taxes, Warner Todd Huston | Comments Off

From the Palatine Tea Party…

The Village of Palatine Passes Another Cap and Trade Ordinance

(Palatine, Illinois) – The Palatine Village Council is following in the footsteps of the Obama Administration moving his progressive agenda forward at the local level. At the Village Council Meeting on December 13, 2010 the village unanimously passed its own version of Cap and Trade Ordinance without the “trade”. This would generate additional revenue to offset the Village of Palatine’s 2011 budget shortfall.
Read more

The Village of Palatine Passes Its Own Cap and Trade Ordinance – Part 1

December 20, 2010 | Filed Under Budget, Business, Cap and Trade, Cook County Board, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Illinois State Government, Liberals, Regulation, Taxes, Warner Todd Huston | Comments Off

From the Palatine Tea Party…

(Palatine, Illinois) – The Palatine Village Council is following in the footsteps of the Obama Administration moving his progressive agenda forward at the local level. At the Village Council Meeting on December 13, 2010 the village unanimously passed its own version of Cap and Trade Ordinance without the “trade”. This would generate an additional $900,000 to offset the Village of Palatine’s 2011 budget shortfall.

2011 Electric Utility Tax

* Electric Utility Tax – Tax based upon consumption of electricity. The taxes are collected by the utility company and remitted to the Village. Those using less electricity will pay less. This is projected to raise $900,000. Village officials see an electricity tax as a stable source of revenue even in poor economic climates.1
Read more

Our Idiotic Courts: Car Gets Stolen, Then Owner’s Held Liable For Theft, Also Trees Get ‘Rights’

December 17, 2010 | Filed Under Animals, Civil Rights, Climate Change, Constitution, Crime, Democrats/Leftists, Environment, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Law, Liberals, PCism, Property Rights, Regulation, Society/Culture, The Law, Warner Todd Huston, Western Civilization | Comments Off

-By Warner Todd Huston

All too often it is an upside down world in our American court systems. Here we have two more stories that really argues for the word “impeachment” to get far more of a workout in our nation than it currently does. In one case, a woman whose car was stolen is held liable for the theft of her own car merely because the keys were inside and in the second, more egregious tale, several courts across the land have decided that trees have “rights” not to be cut down.

First up in our cavalcade of lunacy is the case of the stolen car in Nashville, Tennessee. As it happens a car owned by one Rubye Jarrell was stolen and in the course of the theft and the resulting police chase the thief crashed the car into that of the Newman family. The Newman’s promptly sued the police department for daring to chase a thief. The penchant for people to sue police for doing their job is bad enough but even worse, the owner of the car was also charged with “negligence” because her grandson left the keys in the car “in a high crime area.” This is a crime, apparently, because in this foolish court’s opinion a person that leaves keys in a car is just as bad as a thief that steals a car.

This moronic decision absurdly making the victim just as blamable as an actual thief is yet one more example of our overly litigious society. Was it stupid to leave keys in a car? Sure. Should someone so stupid as to leave their keys in their car be surprised that the car gets stolen? If they are surprised they are doubly stupid. But are they liable for the thief’s actions? Hardly.
Read more

The EPA Versus the USA

December 13, 2010 | Filed Under Alan Caruba, Anti-Americanism, Budget, Business, Capitalism, Climate Change, Congress, Constitution, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Energy, Environment, EPA, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Liberals, Taxes | Comments Off

-By Alan Caruba

It seems almost beyond reason that a single U.S. agency could so hate America that it was prepared to ignore the Constitution, distort a Supreme Court decision, and impose its will on the nation in the name of totally discredited science.

That, however, is what the Environmental Protection Agency is seeking to do while Americans are distracted by the Christmas celebrations.

The agency’s objective is to regulate so-called greenhouse gases (GHG) on January 2, 2011. More specifically, it would regulate emissions from power plants and other large emitters, but in reality it would end the role of coal as the provider of 50% of the electricity Americans require.
Read more

AGW Believers Misunderstand a Closed System

December 8, 2010 | Filed Under Global Warming, Kevin Roeten | 1 Comment

-By Kevin Roeten

Can believing the earth is not a closed system hurl non-technical people down the forsaken path of anthropogenic global warming? Physics tells us that there are 3 types of systems: a closed system (cannot exchange matter, but can exchange heat), an isolated system (exchanges nothing), and an open system (exchanges everything). The earth, therefore, IS a closed system, because no matter is exchanged, but heat can be.

If no matter can be exchanged, nitrogen, oxygen, carbon, and all other elements will remain in the same quantities for the millions of years earth exists. With a finite amount carbon and oxygen, there will always be a finite amount of CO2. As a result, both warming and cooling of the earth takes place, and is partially explained by this video on Solar Variation.

On page 35, in the Climategate Book – Brian Sussman – Exposing Global Warming Scam, practically decapitates Michael Mann’s infamous “hockey stick”. Inserted in a Nature #392 (1998 edition), Mann had a bogus graph that had temperature with the stick positioned horizontally, and the blade pointing straight up. It was a popular method to convince the public the earth was in trouble with CO2-produced temperatures going through the roof.

UN Climate Summit, Cancun, Mexico: Climate Conmen Sending You Back 100 Years

December 6, 2010 | Filed Under Anti-Americanism, Budget, Business, Climate Change, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Environment, Foreign Policy, Free Trade, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Law, Liberals, Mexico, Nanny State, President, Regulation, Science, Society/Culture, Taxes, UN, Unions, Warner Todd Huston, Western Civilization | 2 Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

As most of you know last week I was down in Cancun, Mexico reporting on the U.N. Climate Change Summit (officially called COP16/CMP6). It was several days of sun, surf, and U.N. conmen. I am back in the saddle here at home but Friday I went from the warm white sands of Cancun back to the cold white snow of Chicago. Where’s all that global warming when you need it?

At least I have the modern conveniences of natural gas to keep my house warm and coal and nuclear-fired electric to power my electronic entertainment and work devices both. Unfortunately, if the con in Cancun is successful we may no longer have such luxuries.

One of the last places I visited in Cancun was the Villa de Cambio Climatico — or in English the climate change village. The exhibit was sponsored by the Mexican federal government and was set up in order to indoctrinate Mexico’s school children in the ways of environmental hokum.

At the exhibit we found what was presented as the ideal eco-friendly house. Of course, it was suitably small as the enviro-Nazis most certainly don’t want anyone enjoying a bit of elbowroom in their homes though it did have space for a few modern niceties. It had a tiny computer area, an actual flush toilet, and a four-foot-tall refrigerator that looks like it might be able to store enough food for two or three days.
Read more

Ill. Policy Institute: Cancun Fiesta!‏

December 6, 2010 | Filed Under Budget, Climate Change, Democrats/Leftists, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, GOP, Government, Government, Corruption, Illinois, Illinois Policy Institute, Illinois State Government, Liberals, Taxes, Warner Todd Huston | Comments Off

From the Illinois Policy Institute…

Climate Fiesta in Cancun!
The UN Climate Change Conference is underway in Cancun and Americans for Prosperity cut this video of climate change activists (you know, the ones who want to ration travel, energy, food, and the like) whooping it up at a beach party. Apparently, rationing is for the rest of us.

Spotlight on Spending: Foster Grandparents
Encouraging volunteerism among Illinois’s senior citizens is a worthy goal, with many benefits for both individual volunteers and those they serve, but is the Illinois state government doing a good job at accomplishing these goals—or should be looking for ways to increase senior involvement beyond government programs? Our latest Spotlight on Spending asks these questions.
Read more

The Climate Mafia Gather in Cancun‏

December 5, 2010 | Filed Under Alan Caruba, Anti-Americanism, Budget, Business, Capitalism, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Environment, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Liberals, Mexico, Taxes | Comments Off

-By Alan Caruba

On November 14, 1957, leaders of the American and other Mafia organizations gathered at the home of Joseph “Joe the Barber” Barbara in Appalachian, New York; approximately one hundred Mafiosi from around the United States, Canada, and Italy attended.

Up to then, J. Edgar Hoover, the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, had refused to acknowledge that the Mafia even existed, but a succession of prime time television appearances before Congressional committees by members of the Mafia made it abundantly clear that crime in America was, indeed, organized and led by some very colorful and ruthless descendants of the Sicilian Mafia.

It is time for the U.S. government to acknowledge that a climate mafia has existed since the gathering in Kyoto, Japan, to establish the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.
Read more

EPA Delivers Holiday ‘Sucker Punch’ to U.S. Economy

December 2, 2010 | Filed Under Budget, Chicago, Constitution, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Energy, Environment, EPA, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Illinois State Government, Liberals, Taxes, Warner Todd Huston | Comments Off

From the Heartland Institute…

While we were all preparing to see family and friends over the Thanksgiving, Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency was exploiting the holiday lull to sneak through new regulatory “guidance” that threatens to inflict further damage to the U.S. economy. The Heartland Institute has been on the case since the EPA gave the public just 15 days (with a long holiday weekend smack dab in the middle) to weigh in on the process. You can see all of Heartland’s coverage at this link.

A post at Heartland’s policy blog, Somewhat Reasonable, also outlines the situation. I pass this information along in case you want to share with your readers this attempt to get “cap” without the “trade” implemented by bureaucratic fiat, after the real bill flopped in Congress. You can also get a sense of what’s happening by reading below my signature.
Read more

UN Climate Summit: The Con in Cancun

November 30, 2010 | Filed Under Budget, Capitalism, Communism, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Environment, Foreign Countries, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Liberals, Mexico, Science, Socialism, Society/Culture, Taxes, UN, Warner Todd Huston, Western Civilization | 2 Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

In but a few hours I’ll be headed to Chicago’s O’Hare airport to wing my way to sunny Cancun to do a few days reporting on the U.N. Climate Change Summit. As is my luck in life, sunny Cancun will be rainy Cancun if the weatherman is to be believed. Of course, weather reports aren’t the only thing going on down there that isn’t to be believed.

There has already been some guffaw inducing inanities in Cancun. For instance, an Oxfam report is telling summit attendees that “more than twice the number” of people have died from natural disasters in 2010 than have in 2009. And they tell us this is all due to global warming even though they also admit “it is impossible to link any single event with rising temperatures.”

What is the solution to the problem that Oxfam cannot prove exists? Why your money, of course. Oxfam wants the U.S. to establish a “Green Fund” of at least $100 billion annually to combat all this carnage and global warming.

If a big, multi-billion dollar slush fund that’s at the beck and call of globaloney peddlers isn’t enough, summit attendees are also demanding that the whole civilized world ration itself back to the stone age to “solve” global warming/climate change.
Read more

Greenwashing America

November 14, 2010 | Filed Under Alan Caruba, Anti-Americanism, Budget, Capitalism, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Environment, Free Trade, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Liberals, Taxes | Comments Off

-By Alan Caruba

Every time you see some product being sold as “Green”, allegedly safer or beneficial for the environment, you can be sure that it is more expensive than a comparable product that does the same thing without making this claim.

Everything you eat, drink, wear or use begins as a “natural” product. It is absurd to think that calling it “Green” improves it in any fashion. Countless inspections before anything reaches the marketplace ensure product safety. To put it another way, a carrot is a carrot is a carrot.

Recently I received a news release from a public relations firm touting clients selling Green products such as “Parsley Plus All-Purpose Cleaner”, along with “stylish organic bed linens, “natural and organic clothing”, a “99.6% natural line” of shampoos, and, “100% Bamboo towels.”

Al Gore’s Climate Exchange Scheme Utterly Fails… Media Ignores It All

November 9, 2010 | Filed Under Al Gore, Anti-Americanism, Budget, Capitalism, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Liberals, Nanny State, PCism, Science, Society/Culture, Warner Todd Huston, Western Civilization | Comments Off

-By Warner Todd Huston

Al Gore’s much ballyhooed Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX) has recently announced that it will no longer be engaging in carbon trading, an activity that was the sole purpose that it was created. This is an utter failure of purpose in global warming hysteria yet the Old Media is almost completely silent on this colossal failure.

Why has the media remained utterly quite on this abject failure after unleashing on the public an avalanche of stories that touted the creation of the CCX back in 2000 — and since for that matter? Roger L. Simon and David Thomson wonder just that.

The CCX was the brainchild of Northwestern University business professor Richard Sandor, who used $1.1 million in grants from the Chicago-based left-wing Joyce Foundation to launch the CCX. For his efforts, Time named Sandor as one of its Heroes of the Planet in 2002 and one of its Heroes of the Environment in 2007.

But as of the October 21 announcement that carbon trading would end, the Old Media is nowhere to be seen on the story.
Read more

Nanny State Republican Upton Wants House Energy Committee Chair?

November 9, 2010 | Filed Under Business, Economy/Finances, Environment, Global Warming, Michigan, Nanny State, Warner Todd Huston | Comments Off

-By Warner Todd Huston

Light bulb banning Republican Fred Upton (R, Mich) is angling to become the new GOP chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee as the House begins to look to adjusting to reflect the Republican’s tidal wave election. Upton is a perfect example of the sort of representative that the new GOP congress needs to think about very carefully before elevating them to higher positions.

Upton has the seniority to take the position, it is true, but his past nanny state-styled votes for banning the light bulb in favor of CFLs makes his bid troubling taking into consideration the conservative direction voters went on November 2 — and Upton didn’t just vote for the bill, he co-sponsored it with the left leaning Dem. Jane Harmon of California.

Upton’s voting record is quite a mixed bag where it concerns proving his conservative credentials. Along with the nanny-state light bulb ban vote, Upton also voted against extending the Bush tax cuts, he was in favor of the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), as well as the first stimulus bill.
Read more

Goodbye Global Warming, Hello Biodiversity

November 9, 2010 | Filed Under Alan Caruba, Anti-Americanism, Budget, Capitalism, Communism, Congress, Democrats/Leftists, Economy/Finances, Education, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Government, Government, Corruption, Jobs, Liberals, Senate, Taxes | Comments Off

-By Alan Caruba

After three decades of trying to push the global warming scam to a point where billions could be made selling and trading bogus “carbon credits”, the global schemers have abandoned it in the wake of 2009 revelations that a handful of rogue climate scientists were literally inventing the data to support it.

If there is one lesson to be learned from and about environmentalists, it is that they are utterly relentless. The ultimate goal is one-world government directed from the United Nations by unelected bureaucrats who are soulless strangers to the truth, to morality, to humanity.

The United States supports this abomination to the tune of billions every year.
Read more

Crossroads School, a K Through 12 School Sponsoring Left-Wing Rally?

October 22, 2010 | Filed Under Children, Democrats/Leftists, Education, Environment, Global Warming, Government, Liberals, PCism, Society/Culture, Warner Todd Huston, Western Civilization | Comments Off

-By Warner Todd Huston

Crossroads School for Arts & Sciences, a K-12 facility in Santa Monica, California, is tired of all the political insanity out there. To help ameliorate this state of affairs, the school has decided to use its campus assets, its school email system, and its teachers to sponsor a Jon Stewart-styled rally to “restore sanity” in its area.

Luckily for Santa Monica such “moderate” voices as 60s counterculture activist Tom Hayden, progressive talk show host and activist lawyer Jim Lafferty of the National Lawyers Guild, and others are going to be on hand to shout down the “extremists” out there. But with this list of speakers, “moderation” is the last thing that can be expected.

This rally raises many questions. Why is a school for younger children advocating adult political issues to its students by hosting a list of left-wing, radical speakers and presenting them as “moderates”? How can a school that claims to be interested in fostering “diversity” be lending itself to a rally lacking diversity of thought? Does this school get any federal or state money? If so, how can it justify the use of its teachers, technology, and facilities for a partisan, left-wing rally?
Read more

« Previous Page — Next Page »