Environment

The Fire Burns, the Left Fiddles (and Steals; They Always Steal)

Mark Noonan30 Comments

What has been most pronounced to me as Los Angeles has burned is that when the local officials are giving a statement, they don’t actually say anything.

Sure, they tell us they’re sad.

They tell us they are consulting with everyone.

They tell us that everything is being done.

What they don’t tell us is what they are doing. There’s no plan. No effort to map out a strategy.

This all follows along with the fact that they cut $17 million from the LAFD budget and sent LA firefighting equipment to Ukraine. What it tells us is that those in charge haven’t the foggiest notion of what to do. They are failing and they don’t really understand they are failing…after all, they are sad, consulting and “doing everything”! What more is there to do?

For them, nothing. I guarantee you that Bass will believe for the rest of her life that she did nothing wrong…scratch that: not only did she do nothing wrong, she was downright heroic and showed what a WOC can do! Take that, MAGAts!

The truth of the matter is that running large, modern city is more difficult than any other task in the world. Even being President isn’t as taxing. You are responsible for everything – trash, water, fire, earthquakes, roads, public transport, health care, zoning…on and on and on and every issue has a host of interests often not just competing but diametrically opposed and through this minefield you have to get it running so that when disaster happens – and it always will – the damage is at least minimized and people have confidence that the authorities know what they’re doing.

What is Karen Bass’ experience? Well, she started out in life involved in a Cuban Communist front organization. From there, it appears she never looked back. She did get an education when standards were higher so we know she isn’t stupid – but that just makes it worse. If she were a merely incompetent boob it probably would have worked out better…such often will make a decision even if the wrong one. Bass doesn’t make a decision because she feels she doesn’t have to – she’s a college-educated WOC, dammit…and you racist crackers out there should just sit down and shut up!

The danger we have right now is all up and down our system are people like Karen Bass and worse – people who are dead certain they are heroic geniuses but who aren’t fit to run a lemonade stand. They’re blaming climate change not because they really think that climate change caused a $17 million cut to LAFD but because climate change is our fault, not theirs. It is perfect…gets them off the hook, places the blame on us and the cure is to give them more money and power. The people running the show by and large hate us, hate the USA and have no expertise beyond knowing how to work the system to obtain more money and power.

The perfect contrast right now is with Florida – as hurricanes bore down on Florida, DeSantis has 50,000 people ready to go after it passed to get power back up…knowing that power restoration was the key to all other relief efforts. It worked flawlessly and power was mostly restored quickly. Police were ready so there was no looting. Evacuations happened in a timely manner. There was no lack…because there was a plan and an Executive willing to order it and kick some rears if anyone started slacking. That is how it used to be – even the most corrupt political systems in our past still managed to do the things necessary…today we still have the corruption but absolutely no competence.

And aside from property damage, people die. I’m confident that the death toll will go above the official number of (I believe) 5 at the moment. The fire was moving so fast at first that I’m sure some poor people just didn’t have time (if you’ve never experienced a wild fire, let me tell you: treat them with respect. They can move extremely fast and that after it seems like it stalled at some point). Thing is, everyone knows that it has been bone dry in Southern California for nearly a year (bone dry here in Vegas, as well; indeed, most of the southwest has been bone dry due to the weather patterns). The Santa Ana winds never sneak up on you…they develop like hurricanes in the Atlantic. You know you’re going to get them days before they arrive. In other words, everyone in LA knew the perfect storm for massive fires was coming together…there should have been lots of prep, just like DeSantis did in Florida. Reservoirs filled, plans made to bring in outside firefighters, evacuation routes established, stockpiling of equipment at strategic points…and an overall plan of how to attack a fire where ever it started.

The Mayor of Los Angeles went to Ghana, instead.

How much did that cost the taxpayers of Los Angeles? I do know that a military plane was sent to fetch her home…and just who authorized that? How is it justified to use federal assets to move a city official because it looks bad on TV that she’s not home as her city burns? But don’t worry…I’m sure her budget for next year will include plenty of money for DEI…which is basically just payoffs to her particular cronies.

We’re all for federalism here on the Right but we do have to think about things…because a lot of the tax dollars that will rebuild LA will be federal…and that means all of us have a vested interest in how LA is run. Also, is it a republican form of government if one party gets total control of all institutions public and private in a State and then rigs the system so they can never lose? The Constitution commands the federal government to ensure a republican form of government in the several States…we need to consider if there is a genuine republican government in California. We certainly can’t just let things burn.

The Rich, Not the Left, are the Enemy

Mark Noonan7 Comments

Saw this on Twitter:

And it is real. They are paying people to stop farming. You know: growing food. As has been pointed out: you are the carbon they want reduced.

You see this and then you take Sri Lanka in mind, see all the fast food corps trying to market “beyond beef” products, endless articles about how we can eat bugs instead of meat…deliberately pushing up gas and oil costs while pushing electric vehicles while mega corps buy up residential property to rent it out. Sorry, but I see a plan: reduce human population and have what remains jammed into mega-cities where common folks eat bug paste in their life pods while getting around by bicycle or electric train. Did some group of rich people sketch this out? Not sure: but the various rich people NGO’s are all singing from the same Green hymnal and it all comes out to regular people having less, with the subtext being there will be fewer regular people.

Leave aside whether this is or isn’t a global conspiracy and you’re still left with the fact of what they are doing: in the name of “saving the planet” they are proposing we completely restructure our society to be Green – and no matter how you slice it, Green gives you less food and energy. With seven billion people on Earth, the wheels of agriculture, manufacturing and transport must turn rapidly in order for everyone to get their daily bread. If you interfere with that, there simply won’t be enough to go around. And rely on it, if there are shortages, the rich people telling us to go Green aren’t suffering them. Went to the store today to get yellow peppers and they didn’t have any. Hardly any red peppers, either. This isn’t odd food – this is staple stuff for the modern American diet. Bin after bin where the peppers normally are sit empty. But I guarantee you that if Gates wants some yellow peppers with his dinner tonight, he’s got them or will have them within the hour.

So, in my view, it isn’t the Left that we really have a problem with. They’re just kooks who don’t know anything – the problem comes in when the rich adopt Leftist views and seek to implement them. As to just why billionaires want to impose the ideals of ignorant Marxists, I don’t know for certain. It is probably a variety of reasons: but the underlying issue is that the Masters of the Universe want to remain Masters…and they are more than happy to change title and Party Line as long as they stay rich and in charge. Chesterton pointed this out more than a century ago when he noted that the British Ruling Class would have no problem changing over from being Duke of Norfolk to being Administrator of Norfolk. Because at the end of all plans of the rich, they remain fabulously rich, immune to law and firmly in control. What matters to you if the mass of people are crammed into stinking, crime ridden cities? You’ve just flown out to your private island after another Geneva confab and you’re getting ready for you and your buddies to abuse some young men and girls.

We have to cease worrying about absurdities like AOC or the latest Tik Tok Progressive weirdo who is grooming kids to be trans – these are problems and they’ll have to be dealt with, but the way to deal with them is to get rid of the rich people. Get rid of those who fund, promote and protect the Marxist fruitcakes. The Marxist numbskulls would be powerless and ignored except for very rich people funneling them money so they can attack not the rich, but you and me with our suburban homes, cars and our weekend trip to the beach (and the Rich hates that – hates that right next to their zillion dollar beachfront home are regular folks just being there). And do keep that in mind: for all the Left’s “eat the rich” rhetoric, their practical policy demands are for you and me to have less…less money, less property, less freedom. And who want us to have less? Those who have the most – their wealth is sacred, ours is Destroying the Planet. The footsoldiers of the Left are just too stupid to see how they are being manipulated…but that is no surprise because you have to be monumentally stupid to be a Leftist to begin with. But they are still not the enemy – the most aggressive BLM/Antifa rioter is not your enemy. He’s an idiot. He’s a tool. And he’s sent out against you by people who have fabulous fortunes, almost all inherited or recently acquired via political connections.

Unless and until we make this mental shift and realize that the rich are our enemies, we’re really not going to get anywhere. Any victory will be temporary in nature. Defeated in one field, they’ll just use their money to open up another one…and it doesn’t take them much money. Just a few million dollars can fund all sorts of people and programs to attack us. And what is even a billion dollars to someone with tens of billions? It is chump change – and for chump change, they will destroy you. Unless you take all their money away.

I’m not talking about taxing and redistributing – I’m talking about straight up confiscation. The Ruling Class does it to us all the time via asset forfeiture. Turn about is fair play – their money is forfeit one fine day. We just take it, leaving them with nothing – and then we pass it out to our people in some set increment so that the net wealth of our side increases.

Or, you can adhere to some tired theory which holds that private property includes fortunes of hundreds of billions which are being used to undermine the very basis of normal, human life. Up to you. Pick what you want. I prefer we get rid of those who propose to desrtoy us.

Unilateral Withdrawal From the Open Thread

Mark Noonan34 Comments

Trump disappointed me in deciding against moving the US Embassy officially to Jerusalem, but the withdrawal from Obama’s bogus Paris deal makes up for that quite a lot.

First off, the deal was unconstitutional: it was a treaty which Obama never submitted for ratification. And it was not submitted because it would have been swiftly voted down. Secondly, it didn’t do anything – even in theory, if all its provisions were carried out, the apparent supposed benefit was a mere 0.2 degree reduction from expected warming by 2100, or something. Finally, it appears to require us to shovel many buckets of money at foreign governments and progressive NGO’s. I don’t see any point to the agreement, folks.

It has been very revealing that many of the Never Trump Conservatives are taking exception to this action – including those who had called the agreement, when reached, a bad thing. All of a sudden, it is bad for our global leadership position to withdraw! This is absurd – and shows that Never Trump isn’t motivated by principal, but merely by animus towards Trump. Which is fine – but if you just hate the guy, say that: don’t try to tell me you’re trying to save Conservatism from Trump and then go off and defend something as anti-Conservative as the Paris deal.

Laudato Si: My Take On It

Mark Noonan23 Comments

As a Catholic, first and foremost I urge everyone to actually read what is written – do not trust MSM summaries of it and don’t take the word of those who have a particular axe to grind. Read it yourself – decide for yourself what it all means. Encyclicals are meant to be read; prayerfully and with mercy and charity. But, also as a Catholic, permit me to speak a bit about it. Here are just a few bits I’ve looked over so far.

The first thing which caught my eye is this:

Pope Benedict asked us to recognize that the natural environment has been gravely damaged by our irresponsible behaviour. The social environment has also suffered damage. Both are ultimately due to the same evil: the notion that there are no indisputable truths to guide our lives, and hence human freedom is limitless.

This is an important thing to say – we are not actually entirely free agents. Our freedom granted by God can only be properly used when we are voluntarily choosing to do what is right. It is true that we can choose evil – that is built into our free will…but when someone chooses to do wrong, that is not an act of freedom. It is, actually, an act of self-slavery – someone riveting chains of servitude upon himself. There are indisputable truths to guide our conduct and we ignore this at our extreme peril.

Continue reading →

Global Warming is Destroying the Sahara Desert!

Mark Noonan6 Comments

Interesting – via Hot Air:

A few thousand years ago, a mighty river flowed through the Sahara across what is today Sudan. The Wadi Howar—now just a dried-out riverbed for most of the year—sustained not just fish, crocodiles, and hippopotamuses, but also agriculture and human settlement. As late as 1,000 B.C., a powerful fortress stood on its shores. But then the Sahara dried out, turning from a green savannah into an inhospitable desert. The culprit: climate change. According to desert geologist Stefan Kröpelin, who has studied geological data for the eastern Sahara going back 6,000 years, the desert spread as temperatures dropped. Global cooling meant that the air had less capacity to hold moisture from the oceans, leading to fewer rains and more arid climes.

Now, that same process is happening in reverse. As temperatures rise, the Sahara and other dry areas are greening on the edges. “I’ve been studying the Sahara for 30 years and can definitely say that it’s getting greener,” says Kröpelin, who specializes in desert archaeology and climate history at the University of Cologne. Where there used to be nothing but desert, he says, there is now not just grass but shrubs and acacia trees–and he has the photos from 30 years of extensive field study to prove it.

Grasp what is happening here, Warmists – 3,000 years ago the world was so warm, much warmer than it is now, that parts of the Sahara we know as burnt-over desert were lush savannah. How can that be? Could it be – is it possible? – that perhaps the climate has changed a lot over the ages? That we go up and down and up and down in global mean temperature for so many variable reasons that no one can really figure out why one age is relatively warm and another relatively cool? Could it be, also, that plant and animal species adapt to these changing conditions?

I know: bizarre and freakish theory. Just can’t be true, though – because if it is true, then there’s really no way to blame it on straight, white, Christian males…

Global Warming Hoax Update

Mark Noonan24 Comments

From Don Surber:

After 35 years of telling us carbon dioxide is melting ice in Antarctica, New Scientist is now saying carbon dioxide has caused the ice to grow for 35 years.

What they said before:

From January 2, 2001: “Ice in the heart of Antarctica is retreating and causing sea level rise, scientists have shown for the first time.”

From June 23, 2007: “Rising sea levels could divide and conquer Antarctic ice.”

From March 25, 2008: “Antarctic ice shelf ‘hanging by a thread’.”

From January 21, 2009: “Even Antarctica is now feeling the heat of climate change.”

From March 10, 2009: “Sea level rise could bust IPCC estimate: Greenland and Antarctica are losing ice fast and could end up taking sea levels to nearly twice predicted levels by 2100.”

From July 31, 2011: “Antarctica rising as ice caps melt.”

Got that?

Year-in and year-out, the editors at the New Scientist have warned us that the ice in Antarctica is melting fast…

So, what is New Scientist saying now? That the Antarctic ice cap is larger than ever, and that global warming is the cause.

Face it, we can’t actually win this debate – if glaciers start to cover half of North America, the global warming alarmists will be out there saying it is because of global warming. It doesn’t matter what the facts are because global warming is replacing religion in the lives of people on the left…they have to believe in something, and they’ve decided to believe that (a) humanity (mostly Republicans, it goes without saying) are destroying the planet and (b) only they – the liberals – can save it. You can’t beat someone’s religious beliefs; you can’t argue them out of it. All we can do is hope to win elsewhere enough political power to prevent these numbskulls from wrecking things in the name of saving the planet.

Global Warming Hoax Update

Mark Noonan2 Comments

Interesting:

Critics of those who claim that man-made global warming is a serious threat to the planet and settled science frequently point to the fickleness of scientists on the issue, noting that in the 60s and 70s scientists were warning of just the opposite. It now appears the critic’s claims may have merit as a new consensus is beginning to once again return to the global cooling model…

Of course, this won’t stop our liberals – they’ll just say  its “climate change” and that it’s still all the fault of humans, especially Americans.

The bottom line of all this, however, is what I’ve been saying for years:  we don’t know what is exactly happening with the climate because our data are insufficient; if the world is warming (or, as it turns out, cooling) we simply do not know the primary culprit; finally, if it is changing and even if it is our fault, there’s not much we can do to stop it at this point so we’re just going to have to adapt to changing conditions…as life on this Earth has done again and again over the ages.

The reason I’ve called it a hoax is not because it is impossible for our climate to be changing, but because a hoax is a con…and people are trying to con us out of or wealth and our liberty.  This is, bottom line, a mere attempt by self-selected “leaders” to take charge of all aspects of our lives…and for these leaders to live very well while dictating to the rest of us.  It is just one in a very, very long line of scams.

$1 Billion per day?

tiredoflibbs1 Comment

There is big money to be made in “Global Warming” errr… “Global Climate Change”.  If Al Gore getting rich off this scam wasn’t a big enough clue…  no wonder “consensus” is acceptable scientific “proof” when big bucks can be made.

http://www.euractiv.com/development-policy/global-climate-investment-flatli-news-531212

The lie that 90% of scientists agree that man made climate change is real has been thoroughly debunked due to their severely flawed “peer review” process…..

IPCC Admits Its Past Reports Were Junk

The InterAcademy Council (IAC) conducted an independent review of the processes and procedures of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Based on this review, the IAC issued a report with recommended measures and actions to strengthen IPCC’s processes and procedures so as to be better able to respond to future challenges and ensure the ongoing quality of its reports.IAC findings:

The IAC reported that IPCC lead authors fail to give “due consideration … to properly documented alternative views” (p. 20), fail to “provide detailed written responses to the most significant review issues identified by the Review Editors” (p. 21), and are not “consider[ing] review comments carefully and document[ing] their responses” (p. 22).

In plain English: the IPCC reports are NOT PEER-REVIEWED.

The IAC found that “the IPCC has no formal process or criteria for selecting authors” and “the selection criteria seemed arbitrary to many respondents” (p. 18). Government officials appoint scientists from their countries and “do not always nominate the best scientists from among those who volunteer, either because they do not know who these scientists are or because political considerations are given more weight than scientific qualifications” (p. 18).

Again in plain English: authors are selected from a “club” of scientists and nonscientists who agree with the alarmist perspective favored by politicians.

The rewriting of the Summary for Policy Makers by politicians and environmental activists — a problem called out by global warming realists for many years, but with little apparent notice by the media or policymakers — was plainly admitted, perhaps for the first time by an organization in the “mainstream” of alarmist climate change thinking. “[M]any were concerned that reinterpretations of the assessment’s findings, suggested in the final Plenary, might BE POLITICALLY MOTIVATED,” the IAC auditors wrote. The scientists they interviewed commonly found the Synthesis Report “TOO POLITICAL” (p. 25).

Really? Too political? We were told by everyone — environmentalists, reporters, politicians, even celebrities — that the IPCC reports were science, not politics. Now we are told that even the scientists involved in writing the reports — remember, they are all true believers in man-made global warming themselves — felt the summaries were “too political.”

Here is how the IAC described how the IPCC arrives at the “consensus of scientists”:

Plenary sessions to approve a Summary for Policy Makers last for several days and commonly end with an all-night meeting. Thus, the individuals with the most endurance or the countries that have large delegations can end up having the most influence on the report (p. 25).

How can such a process possibly be said to capture or represent the “true consensus of scientists”?

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/07/ipcc_admits_its_past_reports_were_junk.html#ixzz20mLGz6ss

As the GOD_FATHER OF GLOBAL WARMING LOVELOCK HAS ACCURATELY STATED the DOOM AND GLOOM PREDICTIONS WERE “INNACURATE” and the SCIENCE was far from “SETTLED”. It is factual that a true PEER-REVIEW of IPCC’s process found that their process was flawed, politically motivated. Forced consensus and its conclusions are complete crap.