Baltimore Regresses To 1972

Baltimore Sees the Highest Number of Homicides in 43 Years | TIME:

No secret to regular readers of this Blog -- "progressives" are misnamed, they ought to be called REGRESSIVES! If one wants to look at "settled science" (political in this case), the jury is long settled on exactly how well their policies work.

Human culture took a long and painful road up from a world with no morals, meaning, or purpose beyond individual enjoyment to the pinnacle of Western Civilization -- somewhere in there between the peak of the British Empire and the Moon Landing or so. We battled Communism and Socialism (National and otherwise), and for a brief instant in 1991, one might have thought the forces of good had finally won it all -- but evil is always waiting for good men to rest.

With their deaths, this year’s homicides reached 189, far outpacing the 119 killings by July’s end in 2014. Nonfatal shootings have soared to 366, compared to 200 by the same date last year. July’s total was the worst since the city recorded 45 killings in August 1972, according to The Baltimore Sun.

Baltimore is one of those sterling "All Democrat" cities -- this is Democrat heaven! (Much like Detroit in the past!) Democrat (even BLACK!) President, Democrat Governor, Democrat (BLACK!) Mayor, Democrats in control of both houses of the state legislature!

Naturally, Time Magazine has only "more of the same" suggestions to "fix" this problem -- more programs, more welfare, more talk with police, etc. Perhaps we could legalize a few drugs? That ought to help!

Nobody cares about this. Let's maybe try to cut some minority prison sentences as BO was talking about a few weeks ago. The violent disaster that was the '70s is what moved the wave toward more strict policing that peaked in the '90s with Slick Willie signing "3 Strikes" -- which he now calls a "mistake" because the base wants to let those guys out ASAP!

All this is well known, well understood, we have been here before. Many many thousands more will have to die before there is ANY hope of the rank and file public even getting wind of what is happening around the country.

Baltimore is not unique in its suffering; crimes are spiking in big cities around the country.

... oh, but Cecil the lion got killed! Tom Brady is still fighting his 4 game suspension! No time to be focused on this! Look! I think I saw a Confederate Flag over there!
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Economy In Recession, Nobody Knows

Consumer spending bolsters U.S. second-quarter growth | Reuters:

BO has gotten very unhappy with his horrible economic numbers -- the economy shrank the first quarters of both 2014 and 2014 and barely eked out something below 2% total growth both years. Small wonder that BO, whose economic numbers have been worse than W who started from a very high economic base after the internet bubble (that crashed right after W took office) W  1.7%, BO 1.6%.

As that Forbes article said at the end ...

President Obama “inherited” (another favorite word of the president’s enablers) a low GDP base and did terribly with it, well worse in comparison to his much-maligned predecessor. He inherited a high government spending base and still managed to increase that number at a rate 50% above general growth. In a rational world, we’d stifle such a failure from still having access to the controls.

But then we know we don't live in a rational world, so in this one BO is still in office, and we let him cook the books! The nation has LOTS of time for "deflategate", too little pressure in NFL footballs, but NO TIME at all  for our economic numbers being

Gross domestic product expanded at a 2.3 percent annual rate, the Commerce Department said on Thursday. First-quarter GDP, previously reported to have shrunk at a 0.2 percent pace, was revised up to show it rising at a 0.6 percent rate.

The estimate of the effects of the "new accounting" for GDP was +3%, so the ACTUAL number to be used for comparison would be a .7% LOSS in GDP, putting us in the BO Recession! (Two quarters of negative GDP growth!). The column never mentions that this is now done under the new way of reporting GDP which I discussed here ... as a bonus, they blithely adjusted the first quarter up from -.2 to +.6! Erasing a recession! (they had actually revised the decline to .7% after initial reporting, but since it is now obvious these numbers are just being cooked as desired, "What does it matter now?")

So BO would have officially had a recession on his hands -- but now it looks like a quarter of REALLY tepid growth (.6%) and one that is STELLAR by BO standards ... 2.3%.  Pretty impressive, taking two successive quarters of -.7 which would be a RECESSION, and turning into what the Democrats and media will hail as "solid growth".

If you like your economy, you can elect a putz like BO and it will still all go OK!

When the WH and the media are working together, it takes a little more work to figure out what is actually happening! It isn't going so well ...

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Riots With Nobody Watching?

Articles: Panic in Pittsburgh: Media Struggling to Ignore Black Mob Violence:

The linked article purports to document a large amount of black violence going unreported ... Pittsburgh being the epicenter, but many other cities included.

Is it factual? Who would know? We are busy with Cecil the Lion, Deflategate, the Trump sideshow, etc.

Is it plausible? Regrettably, yes ... something like 6K young black men are being killed on the streets every year now and there is very little reporting.

Mostly just a marker post ... the jury is still well out, but unfortunately it may be true.

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America Finds Cecil Outrage

This American Trophy Hunter Allegedly Beheaded Zimbabwe's Most Beloved Lion | Mother Jones:

MSM and social media has been exploding with outrage over the killing of "Cecil" an African lion.

I'm wondering how many people cared to know the names of any of the 21 Coptic Christians beheaded by ISIS? There have been a number of other cases of Christians beheaded .. here was a case of 30 more, hardly covered. So that is over 50 ... the total must easily break 100, but those are Christians. Who's counting?!

I'm betting that if Christians beheaded some number of Muslims, the outrage would be even larger than that for Cecil -- I'm basing this on outrage over Abu Girab, Gitmo, "extreme rendition", etc and nobody was even beheaded there.

So what gives? I can't say I have a full explanation, but here are my guesses:

1. ISIS shoots back ... the masses assume that Cecil's killer, the Bush Administration, or "Christians" aren't likely to. 
2. People generally don't like Christians very much ... they like lions, and Muslims are vaguely a "minority" ... modern education teaches the masses to like "minorities" 
3. Nobody in the MSM or popular actors and such told people to be outraged about Christians being beheaded -- they tell us to be outraged over Cecil being killed, and we do what the popular media voices in our ears tell to do. 

Sounds about right. Why don't Dentists go out hunting Christians! 

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Read This Blog Post or I Shoot The Dog!

P.J. O’Rourke: How I Killed 'National Lampoon' (Guest Column) - Hollywood Reporter - Hollywood Reporter:

My Dad and his brothers used to talk somewhat incessantly about "The Good Old Days" (TGOD) -- the depression, long trudges to school, only going to school till the 8th grade, milk in cans, no electricity, loose hay, horses vs tractors, threshing bees, steam engines, fishing with a cane pole, ice for ice boxes ... as I said, it was nearly endless.

I can't say I was ever enamoured with the idea of no electricity, nor would I really like to go back to no computers, no internet, no interstate system ( I REALLY need to be able to get to see my granddaughter in Denver!).  I'd have to say that there is really nothing previous to say "1980" that makes me pine away for that version of "The Good Old Days".

My sense is that my Dad's generation believed that much societal change -- larger cities, less local people interaction, bigger government, was "caused" by technology. I think it is safe to say that some of it was ENABLED by technology, but technology is inert -- a gun never makes you shoot anybody, and neither do the combination of the availability of whiskey and cars make you drive drunk. Any form of technology expands your choices -- you don't HAVE to have a cell phone, and having one, you don't HAVE to USE it -- in fact, you don't even have to answer it. Those are choices -- people often let many sorts of technology rule their lives, but that is a choice. Sure, the availability enables that choice, but that is simply how the world is built.

Water similarly enables drowning -- but removal of water is not an option!

PJ hit the nail on the head about what National Lampoon was in the late seventies and early '80s ..

We remember how the publication was a font of youthful nihilism's dark, ironic genius (albeit with the obvious, pitiful, frenetic and stupid qualities that entails).

We never imagined that youthful nihilism would WIN! ... along with the "obvious, pitiful, frenetic and stupid qualities that entails"! It was"progressivism", not "progress" that destroyed my TGODs. Progress is making life faster, cheaper, more reliable, easier, higher standard of living for less work, more comfortable, etc. "Progressivism" is "alienated, sarcastic, cynical, nihilistic" -- except totally school marmish on actual humor, progress,  or real fun!

Gee an NFL player blew off a couple fingers using fireworks and some guy in Maine put a fireworks mortar tube on his head and it killed him. We better BAN FIREWORKS!

Maine Rep. Michel Lajoie told the AP he’s considering trying to introduce a measure to restrict the use of fireworks, though he wonders if it will increase safety.

So we have arrived at the time when some of us have nostalgia for a time when people realized that the dog cover was a SICK JOKE! (but the dog was pretty cute) ... however PJ says it well, basically, the inmates took over the asylum.

That kind of fun can't be had in the 21st century, where there are no normal middle-class values, all the Clark Griswolds are alienated, sarcastic and cynical, and every suburban schlub is a font of nihilism's dark, ironic genius.

BTW ... they had to do that dog picture with no photoshop (talk about the dim and distant past!). Somebody stood off to the side and yelled the dogs name loud enough it took a glance and they caught it. It was a professional model dog ... it was trained to sit and stare at the camera no matter what went on around it.

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Filling That Poly Need

Two Moms, One Dad, Two Babies Make One Big Happy Polyamorous Family - ABC News:



I'm reminded of Michael Jackson "It's a bootiful thing ..."

Michael is a great glimpse into our cultural very near to here future -- certainly a self made "man" ... or, er "something".



People have always had lots of "needs" -- as covered in the ABC "News" story.



In the real world, other than say the speed of light and a bullet to the brain, pretty much everything can be made "gray", "shaded", or "surpassed".  Other than those things like Christianity, Confederate Flags, etc declared verboten by the PC Gestapo, "it's all good" ... in fact in many cases it must be CELEBRATED!! No longer is it allowable to just "turn the channel".



Today I saw a car in the lot of the RAC with a BO sticker and a "Vote No!" sticker on the back -- pretty much an advertisement for mendacity.



BO famously promised "If you like your healthcare you can keep it" as if a gargantuan, largely unknown new program was absolutely guaranteed to do no harm. It was a lie of course, but anyone with a brain knew that.



Similarly, one of the main cries of the anti-amendment people for the marriage amendment in MN was "There is no reason for an amendment -- nobody is talking about gay "marriage" for MN" ... yeah, sure ... it happened the very next year.



All moral arguments can be considered a  "slippery slope" -- they aren't speed of light or death. So we merrily slip down the now "poly" slope. ("Poly want a marriage!")



Yes, change happens just like shit, and decent people feel pretty much the same "need" afterward  -- to flush it away.



This is not the era for decent people -- just in case you were doing a Rip Van Winkle!





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The Bee Crisis Is Over, But Not the Data Crisis

Climate Change Threatens Bees: Even More Evidence : Animals : Nature World News:

The linked article tells us that it really really looks like "the bee crisis" is partially caused by Global Warming -

With the threat neonicotinoid use poses to honeybees gaining international attention, researchers are now focused on finding other factors that are contributing to a worrying decline in bees across the globe. Climate change, they say, is certainly to blame, and parasites may be one reason why.

  This article says what I've been hearing more of from  techie or "right wing" news sources the last year or so ... there isn't any bee crisis.

I have great news for honey lovers everywhere. The Canadian honeybee industry is thriving. Despite those headlines about mass die-offs and and killer pesticides, the number of honeybee colonies is at a record high. Last year, according to Statistics Canada, nearly 700,000 honeybee colonies produced $200-million worth of honey. Bee survival rates have rebounded even in Ontario, which was hard hit by unusually high winter die-offs

The purpose of this post is not to prove which position is right, although I will give my opinion. When a problem is indicated as a "crisis", we know that the title is more intended to convey emotional content and grab interest rather than provide factual information. That indication ought to have the effect of a rattlesnake rattle on our focus as to likely trouble with the assertions in the article.

Couple "crisis" with "Global Warming" -- something that has been crying wolf for over 20 years now, but for the past 15 been forced to quietly try to suppress the news that it has "paused", -- and the chances for "correctness" drop rather dramatically.

My real point here is modern data and "analysis" overload. There is so much data now being collected and so much statistical computing power available to run all sorts of "Spearman Rank Correlation", "Guttman Scaling", "Mann-Whitney U", regression, ANOVA, etc against any sort of data plucked from who knows where and get lots of REALLY impressive charts!

One can definitely show that "Women are better drivers and ice cream sales cause drownings" with no problem at all ... Who drives your car after you were out for dinner and drinks or the traffic, weather, etc are bad?  Who drives the most miles? There is a PERFECT correlation between drowning deaths and ice cream sales -- only it is because of a common third factor -- hot weather, and CORRELATION IS NOT CAUSALITY!

But our brains are wired with a bias to ASSUME that correlation IS causality -- from a primitive POV it makes all the sense in the world to believe that if A and B happen together, they are probably related. Good for survival in nature -- not good for correctness in a wired world with lots of computers. Do enough analysis on data selected with a goal in mind, and you are certain to be able to find "correlation". Add in selective and biased journalism and it is no wonder that people have all sorts of assumptions that they hold as gospel that have at best tenuous and only very specific well manicured connections to the real world.

Statistics are like gauges on your car -- they look at certain data with certain assumptions. Hook the oil pressure gauge to the water temp sensor and vice versa, you get bad readings. ANY of the data is only as good as the sensors -- the engine may have low oil pressure but the sender is not correct for example. Most likely of all, the engine is fine but the sender or gauge have failed.

Today we have bazillions of "sensors" (data collectors) hooked up to all sorts of things on which little if any data was collected before and "scientists" -- many of them little more than amature statisticians and computer software users with a HUGE pressure to "publish something impressive... maybe even about a CRISIS!" spewing "reports / studies / papers" at a rate far beyond anything seen in history. So there is almost constant "crisis".

Add to this the fact that the bulk of them are in one way or another funded by giant governments whose primary mission is the grow government power in any way they can, and it is no wonder at all that "crisis" is MUCH more common than  "boring news day when not much really happened". Remember, the goal of the government is to increase it's size and power -- so government funded research should be instantly suspect if it's result is serving that end.

The real "crisis" is an out of control government growing in power and scope every day.

A Non-Profit Prostitution Sermon

Yes, Your Opinion Can Be Wrong | Houston Press:

Perhaps in the far future, scientists will be able to develop an absolutely scientific and factual view of human  existence from the atomic through molecular to the biologic to the conscious to the societal that is consistent, complete and comprehensible. Edward O. Wilson covered this idea and named it "Consilience". The link takes you to my 2007 Blog on the book. Until we get a lot closer to level of understanding he talks of, we likely should not try to develop any new religions.

But, being human, we have developed the "modern" religion of Secular Humanism, of which a main article of faith is "Climate Change" and one of the leading sacraments is Abortion.

After having sat through sermons of one sort of another in church for 90%+ of weeks for nearly 60 years (I'm sure I got something out of the early ones through osmosis), sermons are nothing new, and the attached article is clearly a sermon.

One could easily replace "Climate Change" with "Young Earth", "Virgin Birth" or "The Cross" -- The factual nature is believed "by definition" -- because it is an article of faith. Non-believers are damned -- either explicitly or implicitly. Those with the "true doctrine" are "saved" ( ... redeemed, included, worthy, blessed, etc).

While we are a long way from "Consilience", science has figured out that we are wired for religion -- (The Righteous Mind for one source). The objection I have for articles like the one linked is that they remind me of a scenario where a young man meets a young woman, they have what he believes to be a wonderful evening together, he is smitten, he is shocked / amazed / honored when she agrees to go home with him -- and then crushed / disgusted / heartbroken when she asks for payment. He thought it was one thing, but it was another.

Religion is religion -- the real contenders are thousands of years old. They all are "promising / selling / asserting" something that transcends the day to day human existence, and for the ones that in my opinion have any claims to reality, have billions of adherents over their millennia of existence.

Secular Humanism is the like the young woman until she asks for payment -- and it may even run on for a number of "dates". It is the religion that claims to be MORE than religion, while never admitting that it even IS a religion -- but it hooks into exactly the same human dreams, desires and emotions.

"“Which number is bigger, 15 or 5?” or “Do owls exist?” or “Are there hats?”" ... therefore "Climate Change" -- is the leading "argument" in this column.  I stated three things unrelated to my premise that are obviously true ... therefore my premise is clearly true, and YOU are "wrong". Oh, and BTW, you should be impressed by my "intelligence".

Modern Secular Humanism (SH)  is more of a cult religion than it is like the mainline religions. It demands that you denounce those that refuse to agree with your tenets --  and not discuss the articles of the SH faith with non-believers. Ideally you "separate yourselves" -- say from the brother, parents, etc that persist in watching "Faux News".  The big promises of SH are very much like the traditional religions ... "fellowship and care" -- as long as you adhere to ALL SH positions you can be friends with our members, not "cast out", and "The State" which is great and good will grant you your daily bread.

That "Climate Change" was one of the items selected for this supposed "wisdom sermon" was unsurprising, but apparently the real onus for the column was the damage that the Planned Parenthood videos had done to the SH honored sacrament of Abortion. The argument used in the "takedown" from "Fact"check.org (a left wing site) was that "PP wasn't making any money off the body parts, so it is OK"!

In the SH religion, if the prostitute is "just breaking even", that makes it ok! Profit is a sin -- and prostitution is not. I suppose the SH flock feels refreshed and uplifted ... or at least smug, when they get through with a sermon like that, but sadly they are actually unwitting victims of non-profit religious prostitution.

It may feel good, but it isn't ACTUALLY a religion for your eternal soul.

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Police Kill 2,993 Blacks in TX Since '08!

In Texas, an illegal immigrant crime wave | Power Line:

Wow! Now THAT is a headline that would get some real attention!

But it is really Undocumented Democrats (Illegal Aliens) that killed that number -- and that is likely quite low, because in includes only those that had been PREVIOUSLY fingerprinted!

Lots of rape and other crimes as well -- but who really cares? These are Undocumented Democrats most likely preying on other Undocumented Democrats! One can assume that the vast majority of their victims are Hispanic and possibly even Illegals -- those are also lives that don't matter. Like the 6K young black men who are gunned down by other young black men each year.

It is maddening to even think about this stuff. There is effectively no way to respond -- calling it out is immediately branded as "racist", and to the extent that the ruling powers would be interested in "doing something", the "something" would be more family killing welfare, government "day care" programs, easy divorce, aid programs to encourage young women to have more and more children out of wedlock -- the very policies that created the disaster we are looking at. Dependence, despair, decadence -- the flower of Democrat policy.

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The Last Time IBM Grew Sales, I Worked There

IBM has been dead money in Ginni Rometty era - Jul. 21, 2015:

IBM hasn't reported a year-over-year increase in sales since the first quarter of 2012. That was also Rometty's first quarter as IBM CEO. (She took over the company on January 1, 2012.)

It might be nice to imagine that it "had something to do with me". No chance -- but I do speculate a bit that my demise and the drop in IBM have related causes.

The last project I worked on was a way to move internet access (digital data breakout) to cell towers "Node B's"  .. moving logic related to being able to do data operations (caching at a minimum, but potentially much more) at the first link between the cellular end node (your phone) and the cellular network.

A nice piece of technology and we got a bunch of patents, but as the Bible says "without vision the people perish" -- as do projects and jobs. It didn't make enough revenue quick enough for the new CEOs taste, so the project was canceled with me along with it.

IBM's business  from the '60s on was being the ruler of the computing industry -- IBM up to 1990 and beyond being built on the momentum of the 360 architecture including Operating Systems (MVS, TSO, VM, etc) to run it as well as DBMS (Database) CICS (Transaction Processing), IMS (inventory and general hierarchical DB ops) ... and a lot of other expensive alphabet soup we could just go on listing.

IBM first lost it's way in the PC era -- creating the modern PC market (with Apple as an also-ran in those days), but failing to be able to exert control in the way IBM did from the 60's through the 70's in it's other markets. Disastrous projects like "Token Ring"  and  SNA -- IBM's  massive bureaucratic behemoth attempt at doing what Ethernet and TCP/IP do so elegantly and well, along with the ill fated OS/2 -- IBM being dumb enough to trust Bill Gates -- as well as not really understanding that in the PC market in those days, "he who wasted the most MIPS wins!".

When you were once exceptional -- as IBM and America once were, the rest of the world takes special joy in seeing you go down. And since the early '90s, IBM has never been able to come up with a vision for the company that would allow it to move into some new form of greatness. The IBM name has become more associated with expensive technical parlour tricks like "Deep Blue", the chess playing computer and "Watson", the Jeopardy computer. While IBM itself is in increasing "jeopardy", these slights of hand have been entertaining to many, but the results speak for themselves.

IBM attempted to shuffle hardware, software and services in various mixes. First to SOFTWARE, hardware and services -- but never really could. Too many powerful hardware people in too many high positions. Then it moved to SERVICES ... with software and hardware fighting in the background and much of services being managing customers moves away from IBM hardware and software.

When there is no overall vision for people to line up behind and in general work towards, they fight for survival for their own piece of turf. Tivoli (systems management software) developed the brilliant strategy of being a "service" wedded to expensive software. When you installed the mega expensive Tivioli package you were locked in to a long term mega expensive services contract to keep it working -- because it took a LOT of people spending A LOT of time on site to keep it running, and as a bonus (for IBM), it ate expensive hardware CPU cycles like an NFL offensive line eats steaks during training camp!

While this generally sucked for customers -- so much so that I and a group of IBMers visiting a customer were threatened with removal from the building if we so much as MENTIONED the word "Tivoli" again -- at the places that it could be enmeshed, it was a major revenue source. Revenue source for that little corner of IBM named "Tivoli" -- but a good way to help get IBM thrown out of a lot of places.

As a flip side, the S/38 -> AS/400 -> i5/OS -> iSeries-> IBM i ???  that I worked on for decades was explicitly designed and largely delivered on being a computer that you could lock in a room somewhere and run your business for years -- even forgetting where it was. (as a few customers famously did, even apparently closing off the room on the AS/400 and not being able to find the source of their computational resources).

You may now be validly wonder if this is going anywhere beyond sour grapes. Maybe not -- but here is the punchline. Computing that is "just there" is exactly what Cloud promises to deliver. IBM certainly had the foremost experts on "Utility Computing" (think of it like your electric power) in the aging iSeries crew  -- of course not without their own set of problems as in being unable to separate the utility delivered from the specific architecture they had used to provide it. The separation from functionality desired from specific example mechanisms is always a challenge.

My vision is that within the next "10 years", someone -- Google, AT&T, Verizon, HP, Oracle ... or someone new, maybe even Apple, or some Chinese company. Will figure out that the Internet is best served from the Node B -- no reason to have a bunch of wires anymore. May as well have all the storage, software, etc managed by "someone else" at the first hop on the network. "Information Technology" (IT) becomes a task of interfacing with a "provider" -- just like electricity or water today.

Like all "visions", this may well not happen, or happen significantly differently  -- and there are LOTS of "technical / legal / business / regulatory / etc" hurdles left in making it happen -- HOWEVER, this is being written on a Chromebook using Google's "Blogger" ... Gdrive is my go to place to put data, photos, etc now. A lot is happening down this road.

Kinda like the old Six Million Dollar Man -- "we have the technology" -- or more to the point, at the time I left IBM we had people with the knowledge to provide computing capability that could be locked in a closet and forgotten (like a Node B), and we had some of the seminal technology to deliver that computing from the first hop from your cell (or laptop, iPad, etc).

Plus, the name IBM hadn't sunk as badly as it has and continues to do now -- while the numbers are rapidly shrinking, there were and likely still are companies that could see IBM as being the the right company to have a "vision" for Cloud Computing that would be worth turning that critical function over to as they do their electricity generation.

Today we have IBM as "dead money"  -- the world of "if" is sometimes bittersweet.

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A Little Climate Ice for Your Summer Drink

Arctic expedition to study global warming put on hold because of too much ice [photos] | Twitchy:

Here in the upper midwest we are enjoying a quite moderate summer -- somewhat on the wet side, maybe a bit on the coolish side, but generally very normal.

In Hudson Bay they appear to be having some significant ice problems -- like "worst in 20 years".

Do either of these mean anything relative to climate on a global scale? Only if aggregated with LOTS of other data and trend lines over LONG periods -- at least 100's of years.

Just like news of heat waves, droughts, and now all "extreme weather" -- but while the media will focus on those and be certain to at least mention "Climate Change", a whole bunch of ice in Hudson Bay is not a story you will likely see much of ... nor for that matter the recent released (with ALL sorts of caveats!) story of arctic ice growing 33% in 2013 alone.

"It would suggest that sea ice is more resilient perhaps - if you get one year of cooler temperatures, we've almost wound the clock back a few years on this gradual decline that's been happening over decades," said Rachel Tilling.

Sometimes even "settled science" has a few "twists" like finding that at least a significant cause for the melting of one of the glaciers in Antarctica that has been a GW poster child is geothermal ...

Always remember -- the stuff that you DON'T see reported is often what is really important to having anything close to a real picture.

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The Scarlet H, Fooled Again

Articles: Every Day, A New Way to Hate:

No ... not Hillary! HATE -- the all purpose way to brand those that fail to rigidly follow all the doctrines of the left.  (although it is not hard to see the connection!)

There was once a book called "The Scarlet Letter" -- it talked of the evil of the Puritans labeling Hester Prynne with a scarlet "A" for Adultery.

Our natures all carry the desire to be "better" -- on the whole, the urge is beneficial for our development as individuals and societies. But our natures also include the desire for "shortcuts" ... for example the idea that by labeling others as "less worthy", our status can be artificially improved with no effort save our adherence to some set of rules or conventions.

Our nation has taken a nasty leftward lurch in the past 6 years -- the work ethic is at lows not seen since the sad 1970's, and all manner of leftward social thought is in rapid ascension. "Puritanism" is part of our wiring  -- it can be directed in any direction. When the standards used for morals for thousands of years are torn down, the same impulses that enforced those standards need a mooring -- so they find it.

So now you either applaud gay "marriage" or you get a Scarlet H. Same for having the opinion that the Confederate Flag is a symbol of the old south -- with all sorts of connotations, both positive and negative -- as all human symbols embody. Transgender -- the list will just grow and grow as the new puritans grow in power.

I'm including The Who, "We Won't Get Fooled Again" because of it's line "Meet the new boss Same as the old boss", but unfortunately, that is not true. The "old boss" was a limited government purposely hamstrung by a Constitution and a careful separation of powers. The "new boss" has no limits -- God is replaced by a "government god". Earthly and flawed, but with Promethean powers. We have been fooled -- very likely for the last time.

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55 Million Lives That Don't Matter

Brit Hume Delivers the Best 1.5 Minute Commentary on Abortion Ever Heard on Network News | TGC:

I mostly put this out to save the link to the Britt Hume commentary.

In the Democrat party saying "All lives matter" needs an apology.

To think, "liberals"  used to love to say things like "a society can be judged by how it treats its most vulnerable" ... now they seek to hide selling the body parts of the most vulnerable.

"Progressives" just keep on "progressing".

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Trapped On An Ancient Starship

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/wired-success/201407/anti-intellectualism-and-the-dumbing-down-america

There is a growing and disturbing trend of anti-intellectual elitism in American culture. It’s the dismissal of science, the arts, and humanities and their replacement by entertainment, self-righteousness, ignorance, and deliberate gullibility.

The  linked article has spotted a problem -- they think. People are getting dumber -- but compared to what? Some list of "facts" that they feel are important? But WHY do they "feel" that those particular facts are important?

What is REALLY disturbing is that they never even mentioned Philosophy, Literature or Theology. If you want to study knowledge, it gets kinda scary when somebody trying to be judge and jury on intellectual pursuits fails to drag out the $5 word "epistemology"!

In order to decide if people are "dumber", you need some standard to compare to. You need to understand something about what it would mean to be "knowledgeable" -- or even WISE! If man wants to be the measure of all things, what does that "measure" look like and why ought I agree to any specific measure?

"God and Man at Yale", "The Closing of the American Mind", "A Conflict of Visions", "Ideas Have Consequences"  are great set of books to understand the basic shape of the problem. I did a shorthand version here linked to a GREAT article if you want to dig a slight bit deeper.

Philosophy was the Queen of the Academy -- along with Literature and Religion. Meaning, values, a sense of "being a part of something important" and LASTING -- say "Western civilization", "Christianity", "America" -- the old one, with a Constitution.

Our technical focus is a major part of this problem -- it gives us "stuff". Some "stuff" is useful and good, but much of it only distracting and alienating. "Stuff" also has a giant bias toward the idea that the latest hootch to drip from the still of "knowledge" is better than the 20 - 30 or 1000 year old "Scotch of Wisdom". If the latest is always greatest, then the past is useless -- so our lives are inherently useless going forward except for whatever personal pleasure we can have in our short stay in this mortal coil. The promised brighter more technically advanced future always makes the lives of the poor dwellers in the present to be pitied.

The core problem is the doctrine of "progressivism" is that it is the inherent enemy of meaning. Without meaning there is no way to choose what is "the good". When man has no concept of what is of ultimate value,  there can be no "body of knowledge" to be achieved to be an "educated person". (how could anyone pick what was of value? the "future" is assumed to be of greater "value")

All we have are equally valued atomized "facts", and the ones of those that are closest to "fact" are only about "stuff" (matter). Even the very concept of "truth" has become largely discounted in many "intellectual" quarters. "Everyone has their slice" -- but nobody knows what it is a slice OF. What it all degenerates into is POWER -- might becomes right. The article degenerates into pure politics masquerading as "intelligence".

74% of Republicans in the U.S. Senate and 53% in the House of Representatives deny the validity of climate change despite the findings of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and every other significant scientific organization in the world;

If you do science, even if 100% of all organizations domestic or intergalactic claim that "Climate Change" is gospel deduced from unicorn farts, if the earth doesn't warm as they predict (and it hasn't so far), they are STILL wrong! An attempt to claim that it is somehow "Republicans" that are "stupid" for failing to read the unicorn fart "truth" is a sure sign of a strong need to look up epistemology -- especially the "scientific method" part! Sometimes a PHD is just a lot of wasted time and money to be more expensively (and usually arrogantly) wrong.

As Freeman Dyson put it so well:

The most questionable of these beliefs is the notion that the science of climate change is settled and understood. The biggest of all climate changes have been the ice ages, which have covered half of North America and Europe with kilometer-thick sheets of ice. Ice ages happened repeatedly in the past, and we are about due for another one to start. A new ice age would be a disaster far greater than anything we have to fear from climate warming. There are many theories of ice ages, but no real understanding. So long as we do not understand ice ages, we do not understand climate change.

If you want to go look at what we know about the history of the earths climate, go look at the cycles of the previous 500K years and then explain to Freeman and I how that happened. That would be an excellent start at understanding how "smart" it is to claim "settled science".

I often feel like Spock (sorry Spock -- FIGURATIVELY, I know you don't "feel"!) on one of those old Star Treks where they come upon the planet or ship which "the old ones" built, but the current residents have no clue as to how it operates. Western civilization was built by "the old ones", and well over 90% of even highly educated moderns have no clue of why it once operated successfully and is now it is falling apart with a stagnant economy, mass addictions, tribalism, suicide, shootings, bombings, etc.

As the article notes -- the decline is becoming more and more obvious and precipitous, but the knowledge of how we rose and why we are falling as a civilization is nearly lost.  The writers of the article assume "decline" to mean "doesn't meet their standard", but they have no basis for that standard beyond "popularity" -- which is not a standard of science, and certainly not of wisdom, theology, or philosophy. 

Oh -- and mixing political hackery with pseudo intellectualism makes for a rather unsavory stew.

I think Kirk and Spock usually blow up the computer at this point.

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Walker in Council Bluffs

Scott Walker comes to Council Bluffs | Power Line:

Good little report on Walker's visit to Council Bluffs IA.

His main theme is that the current good GOP field consists of fighters and winners. He is different because he has fought and won. Powerful message.

The article is short and worth the read. At least conservative politics in the US still involves connecting with people, and that is Walker's main strength. No giant unions of teachers and government workers (I repeat myself) are going to be marching door to door in lockstep for the Republican nominee, so they have to do the retail politics on their own. An aloof Faux Queen like Hildebeast (kudos to Michelle Obama!) wouldn't have a prayer.

Also, as they mention, he is a tough politician that wears his toughness lightly -- in the very worthy tradition of Reagan.

The US is beyond saving -- but at least for us old guys, a slower crash might make some difference.

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Walker in Council Bluffs

Scott Walker comes to Council Bluffs | Power Line:



Good little report on Walker's visit to Council Bluffs IA.

His main theme is that the current good GOP field consists of fighters and winners. He is different because he has fought and won. Powerful message.

The article is short and worth the read. At least conservative politics in the US still involves connecting with people, and that is Walker's main strength. No giant unions of teachers and government workers (I repeat myself) are going to be marching door to door in lockstep for the Republican nominee, so they have to do the retail politics on their own. An aloof Faux Queen like Hildebeast (kudos to Michelle Obama!) wouldn't have a prayer.



Also, as they mention, he is a tough politician that wears his toughness lightly -- in the very worthy tradition of Reagan.



The US is beyond saving -- but at least for us old guys, a slower crash might make some difference.





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Holocaust 2015, Till Death Do Us Part

http://www.redstate.com/2015/07/14/broken-country/

2015 has become yet another horrible descent in the abyss of cultural and moral decay in this lawless region of the north american continent. The tiny remaining minority of decent people keep thinking there must be a bottom, but there isn't! 

Abortion gives insight into the world that would have been if Germany had won WWII and "undesirables" continued to be killed in mass and their "tissue" used for whatever purpose their murders invented. The sacrifice of children has always been a mark of the most primitive pagan cultures. Cannibalism is another -- is the trafficking in the body parts of murdered innocents better or worse than cannibalism? Does it matter? 

For the vast majority of humans still drawing breath in 2015, but bereft of the morals and culture that define what it is to be human, it just doesn't matter. They want their "free stuff", and they have sunk so low that they see each new abomination as a "victory". They just nod to "whatever", and they only "care" if they are told to care. 

There is no moral bottom -- depravity has no principles, so it lacks the mercy of limits. Thanks be to God that human life remains limited however!  We will only be exposed to the depravity till death does us part!  

Chattanooga, Charlotte, Military Carry

Soldiers want OK to carry concealed weapons on base | Army Times | armytimes.com:

Military installations on the US are largely "gun free zones" or has we regularly discover (Ft Hood),  "free slaughter zones". Unless you are "law enforcement",  Police or Military Police -- no gun. So you are a target.

So if you are a Muslim and want to shoot some infidels, what better location than a military installation -- including thousands of recruiting offices across the country?

The first requirement in joining TP ( THE Party, "D") is giving up independent thought. Just like being with "the in crowd" in High School. Check your brain at the door and be quick to pick up on the rules for what it is you are supposed to think, say, wear, do and even what sort of language you are are to use. Some examples:

"Terrorist"? If the perpetrator is named "Muhammad", you have to be VERY careful about any statements and ESPECIALLY any sort of "association" -- with "Muslims, Islam, etc". Even if proof positive is provided that said perpetrator was trained by ISIS, Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, Muslim Brotherhood, Boko Haram, PLO, Al-Shabab, etc, etc it would be VERY wrong to suggest any "pattern" here! (if you are liberal, you DON'T see one!!!)

ABSOLUTELY a crazy acting alone. NO CONNECTION to Islam, and even if it should be shown by extreme evidence that the person was acting DIRECTLY under influence of a specific Mosque, Imam, etc, well, there is NO CONNECTION!!! Islam is the "religion of peace"!

White shooting Blacks"? Clearly a Terrorist linked to all sorts of racism represented by the Confederate Flag!! IMMEDIATE action MUST be taken in order to root out any symbol of this clear organization to which this person was CONNECTED!! No chance it is just a crazy acting alone! Tear down flags, statues, demonstrate, etc. ACTION REQUIRED!

Picture of Muhammad (not the TN shooter!)? Incendiary! Anyone who exhibits one is insanely seeking violence (they must WANT to be beheaded)! We have not quite got the gumption to fully outlaw them yet, but we are trying! Such images are hateful and need to be done away with!

Confederate flag? Likewise -- tear them down. Vandalize sites that have them. Fire people that show one. Take TV shows of the air if one is shown in them.

Crucifix in urine? Gay flag? Anti-Christian speech?  No problemo -- Christians have NO RIGHT TO BE OFFENDED!!! A cross in urine is "art". PRIDE in your sexuality is positive! It deserves to be flaunted in any way you see fit -- those that don't like it can "change the channel / cover their eyes / etc". (oh, if you are Muslim, we are sorry ... try to be quiet. We are OK with you being against homosexuality, it is your heartfelt religious belief, and we respect that for Muslims!)

All of this ought not ever be discussed and certainly not written down. In today's world, tough questions should never be asked of left leaning politicians like BO, as evidenced by the mini-tempest last week when Major Garrett asked a tough question. A non-independent left leaner may not even entertain the idea of "why is there a different standard when questions are asked of those in the middle or right?" Why any even vicious question about "not caring about troops being killed", etc that could be thrown up to W or Cheney was APPLAUDED ... and loudly! "Truth to power" and all that.

BTW -- other than losing some of his cool, BO did fine on the response. He was of course lying, but he does that all the time and very well. His "agreement" is a complete and total sell-out, but that is beside the point. The POINT is the question of it being  legitimate to ASK him hard questions. If one is "right wing" enough to believe in there being more than one political side to issues, then either the answer is YES, or it is ALWAYS no! One simply can't have any shred of independent thought and be angry about the question being ASKED to one side and not the other!

The point of this post though is that you can no longer be a "popular main stream American" and even raise the kind of questions I am raising here.

You have to be 100% against the confederate flag -- no room for "tradition, history, individual preference, etc".

You have to ignore all evidence of the fact that a very large set (not "all") people of Islamic belief are intent to achieve victory over Western Culture and especially Christianity, by violence if necessary, because they believe we are "The Great Satan". The leaders that BO has made an "agreement" with REGULARLY call the US The Great Satan -- they believe it. In the same way that I assume that lefties believe that if we follow whatever their policy de jour is that it will somehow lead to "a better future" (to the extent they have a handle on what "better" is) ... or at least feel it is worth it for their own "going along to get along" that they will continue that they act like they believe that.

You have to be 100% on board for "whatever" from gays.

You are OK with our military not being able to defend themselves on bases domestically. There is no outcry to let them be armed. There is no outcry that domestic Islamic Terrorism is a FAR greater threat than "confederate flags" -- but there is no call to action here!

You care less about a young woman being gunned down in the street of a "sanctuary city", but you were well on board with "Black Lives Matter" ... and you see no problem in this because it aligns with what you know to be "the correct/popular thought".

I could just keep listing things, but you got the point and feel like I do, or you quit reading long ago.

It isn't just a difference of opinion anymore -- the left has become so dominant in this country that all forms of thought and conversation are saturated with "correct" or "reactionary / right-wing / Fox News / etc" instant categorization.

We know how we are SUPPOSED to think on all issues -- some of us just don't think that way.

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"Progressives", No, We Really DO Want A Police State

Liberals Lose to Scott Walker in Wisconsin Again, Again - The Daily Beast:

Reading this makes it clear that the left desires a police state rather than "politics", which can be "corrupt" ... I mean, if there is "another side", then the the "progressive" forces (which are ALWAYS the "moral" ones) have to deal with opposition. Having an opposing party is "corrupt".

The "no coordination rule" is like all the other campaign finance rules -- it is designed to stop CONSERVATIVE political speech. NBC, ABC, NPR, George Soros, MoveOn.org, the Clinton Foundation, loads of other PACs, University Organizations, Unions, etc, etc can operate in LOCK STEP with the Democratic Party for fundraising, policy -- ANYTHING!

Other than the case of GOVERNMENT Unions overtly operating as part of the Democrat party, I have no beef.

While "progressives" find the fact that there are conservative organizations, and they talk to each other to be somehow "corrupt", the only case I find to be corrupt is the case of the government union acting in concert with one political party. The MSM, the educational apparatus, thousands of left wing organizations, and of course unions all talk and act 100% in lock step from the Democrat side.

Knocking down doors in the middle of the night and running secret investigations is EXACTLY what the left ALWAYS does -- USSR, Nazi Germany, China, Cuba, etc, etc -- and WISCONSIN!

The thin veneer separating us from the totalitarian police state has never been thinner -- it is so thin in fact that a number of people now openly advocate for a Police State to remove removal of all political opposition.

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Walker Derangement Syndrome -- A Good Sign

Walker Derangement Syndrome Off to a Fast Start | Power Line:

When you stand for something, you are BOUND to have enemies! Reagan was HATED by the MSM, the elite and the left of course. He was VERY successful.

Walker has successfully brought Wisconsin back from a virtual socialist backwater, now showing some signs of economic growth. He has also stood up to public unions -- the first politician to do that since Reagan stood up to PATCO.

He has experience, he has backbone, AND, he is willing stand up to the high and mighty arrogant powers of the left. At this point, I'm convinced he is the best option that Americans that would like to see some shreds of American greatness survive a bit longer have for 2016.

The state of America today is a bit like having the Sta Puft Marshmallow man show up to your house fire -- not good at all, but better than no marshmallows!

BTW, it seems that Walker did his announcement with NO TELEPROMPTER! ... Just imagine how brilliant the press would think he was if he was a D!

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Baby Parts For Sale -- Who Cares?

Baby Parts for Sale : snopes.com:



Not a single MSM source has picked this up that I could find, though it is getting coverage in the conservative space. Snopes is still non-committal, and it MIGHT be related to James O'Keefe who brought down ACORN by taking covert videos of them helping bring in illegal alien underage girls for prostitution -- the left was really ticked about ACORN being brought down. Illegal alien underage girls for prostitution? Why would THAT bother them???



Let's face it -- what part of NO MORALS is it that people are always failing to get? If you will kill a baby, sanction gay "marriage", be fine with gay "parents" having a sexualized young boy dancing in a gay pride parade, then what could it possibly mean to draw some sort of a "moral line"?? To even think of such a thing calls one with the idea into question as not being fully on board with the cool folks agenda!



No limits is no limits -- your betters have spoken, you best stand and applaud! Oh ... and BTW, take down those OFFENSIVE Stars and Bars! Learn to do as you are told -- and enjoy it!

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CNN Solar Ice Age, The AGW Memory Hole Begins

http://www.cnn.com/2015/07/13/world/sun-irregular-heartbeat-ice/

In 10 years or so, "Anthropogenic Global Warming" is very likely to be in the same class as "Reagan risks war with USSR" and "The World is out of oil" are today.  That the world was out of oil was "settled" for the learned, following,  and media classes in the late '70s. The long term certain success of the USSR and the rank stupidity of challenging them was similarly certain past the mid '80s.

"Always certain, frequently wrong" has been the mantra of the "rulers, intelligentsia, experts, chattering classes" since we sat around the campfire in skins -- the average man is always much more willing to listen to someone that is CERTAIN, so the Shamans always are.

Mooses on the other hand, never are -- but we do observe present and past,  what actually happens, and ALWAYS point out that "predictions are hard to make -- especially about the future!" (Berra).

I've covered this a number of times in this blog, but it is interesting to see CNN and others now realizing that the sun might have something to do with climate! (the "scientists" they quote still aren't sure -- I wonder if they will figure it out if it really

Note also the willingness to make a prediction only FIFTEEN YEARS into the future by the solar guys! .., vs relying on predictions 100 years into the future as the AGW crowd does. I guess they have to, since their 15 year predictions have already been shown to be total bunk.

Anyway, it might be a good time to buy tracks for my Ranger! Just imagine how HAPPY the AGW folks will be if the HORROR of a few inches of sea level rise is actually replaced by inability to grow crops over the bulk of the food producing areas of the planet! How WONDERFUL! Cutting the number of humans and vastly increasing the number of polar bears! -- enough to warm the cold heart of a Warmist!

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"Escaping" Our God Given or Random Advantage

I tried to escape my privilege with low-wage work. Instead I came face to face with it. - The Washington Post:

The author of the column definitely successfully escaped any advantage he had as a writer -- or probably he just never had any natural advantage (talent) in that area. Either God created a system in which those with advantages flourish, or such a system arose out of the chaos of randomness for unknown reasons. In any case, advancement, and even survival demands that advantage be discerned from disadvantage and the advantages be utilized toward what those with working advantages deem proper  -- either to follow the will of God, or to just thumb our noses in the face of a cold and random cosmos.

There must however be a "human lemming" switch built in somewhere that forces a human culture, once it has achieved sufficient (clearly temporary in the US case) dominance, to declare itself "unfit / unworthy" and go the suicide way. Let me "escape" any advantage I have -- certainly my "privilege".

Somehow I can't see a cheetah cursing it's speed and deciding to wear weights on its ankles because it has "a speed privilege it can't escape". It is absolutely clear that Vladimir Putin is not soon going to wash his hands of health, wealth and a strong character just because he feels bad for what a weak fool BO is. ISIS is likewise not going to be giving up any of their advantages just because BO thought they were "JVs", but now says "it will take a wider and longer approach" to defeat them. Apparently the US has REALLY been successful in giving up any military advantage we might have had -- we are now locked in a long term undefined struggle with the "JV team"!

I'm quite certain our "friends" the Iranians will sort out the mideast to whatever form they feel to be their advantage once they successfully have the bomb -- with nary even a first thought, let alone a second, of if they are justified in using their nuclear privilege, so generously bequeathed by their benefactor BO!

The race goes to the swiftest, the strongest, the smartest, or sometimes just to those that wait for fools to hand over the advantages they have with no thought that tomorrow's "privileged" may not be so inclined to benevolence.

In fact, one needent read much Islam to KNOW for certain that our options are "convert or die" -- they are more than fine with either choice.

Hope and Change indeed.

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BO Ally Against Arrogance Rises

“Evil Never Sleeps” | Power Line:

The remaining tatters of the once great US are "the evil that never sleeps" to BO's anointed mideast nuclear regional power. In complete agreement with BO's analysis of his "Dreams" book, the US and the western powers have been "arrogant" -- so the world can be made much better by taking them down a peg -- or two or three.

Israel? After his buddies in Tehran have stated so many times that they WILL reduce it to radioactive ashes, one must assume that BO shares that as the proper "justice" for the Jewish state -- finding blacks that are not virulently anti-semitic has always been a challenge. In Jeremiah Wright's church, the evil of the Jew was nearly as damnable as "God damn America!". A suicidal nation picks it's means of destruction and calls it "choice".

Iran's own state news says it best -- it must be a banner day for anti-colonialists everywhere to see a former British Colony and US ally before it's abandonment by Carter rising to the inevitable destruction of Israel -- yet another British creation. Britain was the power that BO's grandfather and father fought against -- how sweet for BO who pledged himself to pick up their task crying on their graves.

The impending collateral damage of 8-10 million jews as Israel gives its life to the nuclear victory pyre as Iran rises will no doubt be a day of even greater glory for BO.

In the words of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei, “The campaign against arrogance is one of the principles of the 1979 Islamic Revolution and the Holy Quran mandates the drive against arrogance.”

Within this context, there should be no respite from the campaign against arrogance, even after the conclusion of the nuclear talks with the P5+1 group (the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China).

It is hard to imagine, but I'm sure there will be those who claim "shock" the day the mushroom rises over the Holy Land -- I can't accept their sincerity.

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Climate "Surprise", Geothermal Heats Glaciers!

Natural geothermal heating in melt-hit Antarctic region 'SURPRISINGLY high' • The Register:

The "settled scientist" has to live either a life of only looking at computer model data in a darkened room, or be forced to face a number of "surprises". So the shock when they discover that geothermal heat melts ice! Who would have imagined it! ?

The life of "settled science" one of "strange happenings" -- when you KNOW that the planet is heating, you can be forced into a situation of "no explanation" for why sea ice would be expanding from already record (in very short history, like < 100 years) levels.

I mean, they KNOW that the temps are rising, so it is indeed a complete mystery as to why more ice is being created!

When your hypothesis/theory becomes an article of "settled religions faith", data which fails to fit your hypothesis/theory can't be explained!

Thus proving that whatever man holds to be his "highest good" becomes "religion" -- of which, "science" is a very poor compared to Christianity.

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BOcare For Housing AFFH

Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing Rule Passes | National Review Online:

AFFH ... Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing ... 377 pages.

In true Lutheran fashion, What does this mean?

It means that red voting areas in blue states are about to turn blue. Take MN 6th distrifct, the one that Michelle Bachman held. It is a red district in a blue state that is NOT DIVERSE!

AFFH will move "the right kind of voters" into the 6th until it IS "diverse" (BLUE!) ....  better yet, in some "low density areas" (read suburbs with large lots and houses), a few  McManshions will be eminent domained (see Kelo ruling by SCOTUS in 2005) and a nice high rise for low income housing of proper diversity will be put up!

No need to do this in proper limosine liberal suburbs with huge homes -- eg BO's Hyde Park Chicago neighborhood. Already BLUE! (generally lilly white as well save the BO family, BUT ... no need to "diversify" -- already BLUE!).

A TWO-Fer! Punish your enemies in red by lowering the property values in their neighborhood, PLUS, turn a red neighborhood blue! Of course it is RACIST to say that building a high rise full of low income voters in the middle of a low density neighborhood will lower home values! Heck, it may even be "hate speech" to claim such that can get you locked up!

Over the slightly longer term, this is a major part of the strategy to lock blue in everywhere -- why not move a couple thousand "Undocumented Democrats" into a few key districts outside of say Oklahoma City? No voter ID, instant blue!

Law? We don't need no stinkin law -- we have HUD!




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What Color Is Your Socialism?

Socialism on the Left: It's White| National Review Online:

As we now have an actual admitted socialist out on the campaign trail (Bernie Sanders ... BS, appropriate initials!)

The linked article is a worthy read. I'm reminded of people who have detailed plans for what they will do "when they win the lottery". The American Left is like those people -- they believe that they are building a Scandinavian future right here -- with millions of brown people constantly streaming across the border from the south right in the midst of their imagined "progress". I agree with the following paragraph, although it isn't OCCASIONALLY -- it is common.

The Left occasionally indulges in bouts of romantic exoticism — its pin-ups have included Fidel Castro and Che Guevara, Patrice Lumumba, Mao Zedong; we might even count Benito Mussolini, “that admirable Italian gentleman” who would not have been counted sufficiently white to join Franklin Roosevelt’s country club — but the welfare states that progressives dream about are the whitest ones: Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, etc. The significance of this never quite seems to occur to progressives. When it is suggested that the central-planning, welfare-statist policies that they favor are bound to produce results familiar to the unhappy residents of, e.g., Cuba, Venezuela, or Bolivia — privation, chaos, repression, political violence — American progressives reliably reply: “No, no, we don’t want that kind of socialism. We want socialism like they have it in Finland.”

Translation: “We want white socialism, not brown socialism!”

While our US socialists like BO, BS, Hilly, etc like to talk about "diversity", what they mean is "Everyone must think exactly alike". When your political and world view are based on fantasy, fiction and a total lack of consistency, it seems totally reasonable to postulate a nation where a racially, ethnically and culturally diverse population will cheer in wild unity like those beaming throngs of National Socialist Germans once did, or at least quietly and efficiently comply like the throngs of Finns, Swedes, Danes, etc today. A not very close look at any of those adoring masses of socialist utopia would give pause to any but those who hold to the radically inconsistent and fabulist creed of modern american liberalism.

Socialism and welfare-statism, like nationalism and racism, are based on appeals to solidarity — solidarity that is enforced at gunpoint, if necessary. That appeal is more than a decent-hearted concern for the downtrodden or the broad public good. It is, rather, an exclusionary solidarity, a superstitious notion that understands “body politic” not as a mere figure of speech but as a substantive description of the state and the people as a unitary organism, the health of which is of such paramount importance that individual rights — property, freedom of movement, freedom of speech, freedom of association — must be curtailed or eliminated when they are perceived to be insalubrious.

No doubt in the minds of the fabulists, the idea that "successful socialism" is ethnically homogeneous is racist -- pay no attention to past or existing examples! Indeed, paying no attention to reality and calling your opponents nasty names is one of the chief cornerstones of the left.

The idea that different groups of people -- even different religions! might think and behave differently can be BOTH celebrated on one hand, and discounted on the other once all need for even minimums of logical consistency are abandoned -- and so it is for the modern american liberal!

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Reality Has Failed, Piketty Demands Fantasy

Austerity Has Failed: An Open Letter From Thomas Piketty to Angela Merkel | The Nation:

"Austerity has failed" ... and probably gravity, truth, death, the passage of time and aging with it!

I've read most of the celebrated on the left Piketty book, "Capital" ... it is an academic dream, lots of data and sweeping conclusions that have little to do with the data or any real world principles. It's primary weakness is that it fails (as the whole left seems to) to understand that "Capitalism" as in "the free exchange of goods and services for mutual benefit" wasn't created by humans -- it is simply part of our existence, like walking, language, heterosexulal sex, etc. It can to some degree be controlled or modified -- like gravity, truth, death, etc, but only at great cost and like nature, it will "find a way" -- as the black (but capitalist) market always does when the state attempts to control markets, no matter how draconian the measures.

What has REALLY failed (as it always does) is SOCIALISM -- which is completely UNnatural, but it is what the left and Piketty like, so they really really hate to see it fail.

Thus, they want to hide the failure and stave off the ultimate reckoning -- as they always do. Thus loan forgiveness, more loans, longer terms, more highly paid bureaucracy to "control it better this time", etc, etc.

People enjoy spending other people's money, so they get really cross when they run out of it and have to face "austerity" -- if they can avoid it, they will! So the hopeful Greeks with guys like Piketty cheering for them loudly cry "GIVE US OUR FREE STUFF!!!!".

The true anthem of Socialism.

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Taking The Soul Hole

The New Totalitarians Are Here:

As we in the central region of N America bend to the lash of our betters, we need to know whom we serve. Are they authoritarians or totalitarians?

Simply put, authoritarians merely want obedience, while totalitarians, whose rule is rooted in an ideology, want obedience and conversion.

As we look at the Confederate flag issue as well as gay "marriage", it is clear that our ruling elite is of the totalitarian stripe -- mere fealty is not sufficient, our "hearts and minds" must yield to their superiority. We must love them as well as serve them!

So know what it takes to survive in this brave new land without rule of law.

They want obedience, of course. But even more, they want their rule, and their belief system, to be accepted and self-sustaining. And the only way to achieve that is to create a new society of people who share those beliefs, even if it means bludgeoning every last citizen into enlightenment. That’s what makes totalitarians different and more dangerous: they are “totalistic” in the sense that they demand a complete reorientation of the individual to the State and its ideological ends. Every person who harbors a secret objection, or even so much as a doubt, is a danger to the future of the whole project, and so the regime compels its subjects not only to obey but to believe.

It is not enough to admit defeat -- the terms of this surrender must be total. You must love your new earthy god with "all your heart and all your mind".  While the modern progressive statist admits to no eternal soul, they definitely take the hole left when they force you to renounce your soul to join them.

Most of all, they do not want you, Present Reader, to even think about agreeing with people like Thomas or Young. By attacking everyone in the public sphere from judges to writers, they’re sending a clear warning that there’s plenty of room in the bonfire. It is a vow that you will be held to account for your personal thoughts, even if you’ve already been defeated in a democratic or judicial contest.

No, even after losing, you will be forced to admit the error of your ways. You must accept that you’ve sinned. You must discard your own values and accept the ideas of your betters. You must denounce yourself for undermining the construction of a better world. 

You, too, must love Big Brother.

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Riding, Helmets, Viva la Vida

Uneasy Rider: Boomer Deaths in Motorcycle Crashes Jump - WSJ:

A couple of things bring this topic up. The most recent is a 320 mi up and back Wing ride to Barron WI  on Sunday along with being in IA for the 4th weekend where the ABATE rally was being held at Algona in the area we were at.  Hundreds of bikers on the road without helmets.

Riding up to Barron and back via the scenic route I saw at least 50 bikes -- maybe a handful had helmets. I was most impressed by being behind a nice burnt-orange Harley Electra Glide style who was behind a slower vehicle in hard to pass country. When we finally got an opening, he pulled out and I hit the gas and immediately closed the gap and considered just going around him as well for a second, but decided "I'm already at 80 MPH ... where is the fire? So pulled in behind.

Helmetless, he apparently was headed for a fire -- I hung with him for a bit as he slowly crept the speed up to at least 90 -- I was already back in 5th and just went back down to 64.999999. He continued blasting down the highway and disappeared. Apparently as unconcerned about tickets as his head.

BTW, I was glad that I didn't do much for speeding this weekend -- on a road in IA with VERY little traffic where the speed trap was SHOCKING, there was a county mounty with the radar that gave me the flat hand pushed down and flipped the lights on but stayed sitting for my 64.9999 in the 55 in the Avalanche. Saw four other cops set up and met a few more in both IA and WI, so the troops were out of the 4th weekend!

The second incident of impetus was on the leg home as part of a nice 360 mile jaunt up to Barron a week ago with my wife that included a great run through Somerset WI, Hudson, River Falls, Prescott and down the WI side on 35. On the S side of Pepin WI, just after acclerating back up to 60ish, a white pickup made a swerve for me ... the snake brain (unconcious automatic reflexes) worked properly and rapidly, I swerved immediately right (I was in the left side of the S bound lane with wife on the right) and nothing happened -- good shot of adrenalin for both the wife and I, and life went on.

So a little data from the linked article ...

The number of motorcycle deaths per 100 million miles traveled trended down to 23.4 in 2012 from 38.8 in 2003, U.S. government data show.

The rate for cars is 1.5 deaths per 100 million miles -- so like at least 20x more dangerous to be on a bike in raw data. From other stats, one can cut the risk by close to half by wearing a helmet (10x), another close to half by not drinking (5x), and another close to half by not driving at night. So MAYBE something like 2.5x as risky -- MAYBE ... I'm being optimistic by addiung the effects. 10x is more likely as "safe" as a bike gets. 

But all that is not really how our human brains work.

My mental makeup is pretty close to the "scaredy cat limit for riding a motorcycle" -- my trust level for other drivers is darned near zip even in a car and approaches "paranoid" on a bike -- especially after things like the white truck incident.

I believe that people with the "fighter pilot, surgeon, NFL QB" kind of brain get MORE confident when they successfully avoid a "close one" like the white truck -- they look at it as "see, I have what it takes". I  look at it as "damn, I'm glad the snake brain didn't screw up THAT time, but I STILL don't trust it!".

I strongly suspect that the 90+% of the bikers with no helmets that I saw on the roads this past weekend enjoy their rides more than I do because they are confident that they will not be one of those bad statistics -- they will get their 10k, 50k, 100K, or even million lifetime miles on bike with nothing very bad happening to them because they are GOOD and LUCKY! -- but they mostly don't think about it at all and just enjoy the ride, which I actually believe is the much better attitude.

But that isn't me! I do enjoy the ride (with some fear) --- but what I REALLY enjoy are the glorious memories of the rides.The emotional joy of being able to completely beleive that "I'm going to be OK" and riding down the road with the wind in your hair (or your scalp in my case) is a joy that I'll never know in this life -- and I'm jealous of that on occasion, but I'm wired as I'm wired.

Statistics have real limitations for us as individuals -- cancer, heart disease, accidents, Alzheimers, etc -- none of us get out of life alive. So we live -- as best we can, but still imperfectly. Some may be certain that when that last moment comes that St Peter will (or won't) call their name, but I'll just have to go on in HOPE!  Such is the lot of the Moose, who most assuredly never has and never will rule the world.

"Viva la Vida" (Live Life) !

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Sanctuary, Shit and Sheep

The deep meaning of San Francisco | Power Line:

Detroit, Baltimore, Ferguson (St. Louis) ... we KNOW the results of the D policies, but somehow the descent of once great cities into reeking LITERAL shitholes on top of the death and despair is kept quite quiet.  When all that is meaningful in life is removed and replaced by depravity, the descent of the human animal nature into the lowest of forms is quick and certain.

So this past weekend we see 10 killed and 55 wounded on the streets of Chicago. The news of this and the young woman killed in SF by a 7 time convicted felon and 5 time deportee, walking the streets of a "sanctuary city" as an Undocumented Democrat (illegal alien). The city is a "sanctuary" for shooting innocents and shitting on the street -- decent folk need to get the hell out as they did from Detroit decades ago.

The linked article is well worth the read -- and even taking a quick gander of the articles it links to that show that some of the little folk in SF are getting to be a bit nonplussed at the results of their royalty left wing ruling class in the limos. The AC filters out the stench of the policies the left imposes.

40 years ago at the end of the sick, slimy sad seventies, people were finally FED UP! They were angry at the decline, the crime, the filth, the loss of US stature and the Carter statements of turning off your Christmas lights and turning down your heat because the world was out of oil.

Enough of the WWII generation was still vigorously around, and the Boomers were even able to put down the weed and the beads long enough to decide that maybe it was time to DO SOMETHING! Reagan was elected, the direction was changed and we had a 25 year rebirth of an America that was quite stunning -- it didn't reach the moon, but at least it tore down that wall!

But this time the fire seems to have gone out. One might think that Americans would be more inclined to stand up to rag-headed desert vermin that rape little girls and hack the heads off people in orange jumpsuits  than we were to stand up to Russian commies that built ugly walls but sent mostly their own people to die off in gulags for saying the wrong thing -- but one would be wrong.

Today, WE at least figuratively send folks off to the virtual gulag for not baking certain cakes (gay) or baking others (confederate) ... or saying the wrong word, flying the wrong flag, or such. Today we by and large do what we are told -- and that is NOT what it once meant to be an American! This little image covers it well -- being American once meant STANDING UP TO POWER -- now it means the silence and compliance of the lambs.

Superman once fought for "Truth, Justice and The American Way". Today "truth" is largely what the left says it is, and questioning it is a major social sin. "Justice" has been perverted into the government taking money from the people that earn it and giving it to those that don't. What WOULD the "American Way" be today? Certainly not working hard. Certainly not creating a successful business ("you didn't build that"). Absolutely not faith in God ... "Country"? What **IS** "country" with no respect for a written Constitution by the POTUS or SCOTUS?

So we are left with "Sanctuary and Shit" ... and the Sheep are silent in the belt of territory between Canada and Mexico.

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Sacred Elephant Facts Frames Emotions

Faith vs. Facts - The New York Times:

MOST of us find it mind-boggling that some people seem willing to ignore the facts — on climate change, on vaccines, on health care — if the facts conflict with their sense of what someone like them believes. “But those are the facts,” you want to say. “It seems weird to deny them.”

And yet a broad group of scholars is beginning to demonstrate that religious belief and factual belief are indeed different kinds of mental creatures. People process evidence differently when they think with a factual mind-set rather than with a religious mind-set. Even what they count as evidence is different. And they are motivated differently, based on what they conclude. On what grounds do scholars make such claims?

The big devil in the detail of all epistemology (study of knowing and what is knowable) is that it all must be done using human brains. We have no idea of how many vast unknown fallacies we face that are in the nature of the fish, or better yet, coral, contemplating the concepts wet/dry. All of our thinking about thinking is done with the same limited human brain.

I'm going to VASTLY oversimplify here, but maybe just a tiny bit less than the column author.

First of all, we ALL do our thinking from a specific "World View"  (WV) -- it is our "meta-model" of God and man, who we trust, our language, our culture, our values, our experiences, our friends, organizations we are part of, our politics, our gender, rural / urban, level of education and what form -- etc, etc. Our WV is essentially "who we are", and for all of us it is unconsciously there all the time, and for a few of us, we are able to at least recognize that it exists.

The author of the column is apparently not able to do so. Our WV **IS** our real religion -- we BELIEVE IT! All of us! She believes pronouncements of science on warming / vaccines and no doubt a number of things are FACTS. A few months ago when the NIH decided that cholesteral wasn't near as bad as they thought it had been for 50 years, she might have felt a "twinge" -- or even more likely, she just didn't pay any attention to it. It was for her exactly like a religious believer dealing with some doctrine of their faith that they find "troubling / questionable". I say exactly because we all consider our WV true by DEFINITION!

Everything we "know" is "known" and understood in some sort of a "Frame" -- which I covered relative to the book "Don't Even Think About an Elephant" ... and a number of other posts around that one.

For ANY of us to be able to critique our own WV or our various "frames" is like learning a new language, a new computer operating system, complex skill, etc -- it is PAINFUL! Rather than automatically "knowing the truth / facts", we become PAINFULLY aware that even the simplest elements of what we are CERTAIN of can be very very hard to defend if we are faced with either a real event that shakes our WV, or exposed to someone who brings some element of our WV into question.

You KNOW what red is, but to explain it to a blind person gives a little idea of how hard it is to step outside of your WV / Frames. 

For most of two thousand years the dominant WV with many interelated frames was "Western Christian Civilization" -- the universe was created by an omnipotent, omnicient, omnipresent God for a purpose -- partially to allow humans the joy of life and fellowship with God, and most likely for other purposes beyond the capability of man to comprehend from our mortal and fallen state. For myself, and other people that the author of the column looks down on, all that is still true.

For the column author -- and an increasing number of especially the political left though, god is dead, the universe is cold and beyonnd indifferent -- to man, life, or anything. There is no ultimate purpose save man getting "smarter" and creating "better stuff" -- technology, governments, pastimes, ideas about how to live -- on his own with no reference to history, philosphy, and certainly not to "religion". Any "heaven" to happen will be here on earth, due to "progress" -- of which the moderns like the author strangely believe is for somehow "destined" (randomly I guess) to "better", although it becomes harder and harder to imagine how one might arrive at that value judgement. (like what "values" count except power?)

No doubt for the column author (as for all of us), emotion is involved. I wonder how she thinks of GMO's? Many of the left have a reaction to them which is possibly more anti-science than questioning climate change -- humans after all CLEARLY created GMOs, climate historically changed a good deal without us.

As the GMO column points out, fear is possibly an explanation for the GMO reaction. It is also a common method used to hold people in thrall to beliefs like "Anthropogenic Gobal Warming" (AGW) -- "Thou must follow the high priests of AGW or thine children will burn in the hell of AGW"! A not too clever thinker might note that this sort of sermon varies little from "Sinners in the hand of an angry God" of times past.
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Since all religions are made up of humans, it is really not too hard to see parallels. In the liberal AGW religion, the flock need modify their lifestyle not at all for the forseeable future -- "the wealthy", or "the oil companies" or "someone else" will provide propitiation for their computers, internet, jet flights to warm climates for the winter (no irony there), etc.

To  be human is to have a religion (WV), worship and attempt to follow it's tenets. The PRIMARY tenet of all religions is to declare your faith! The author of the column is doing well at that. For many religons -- Islam, National Socialism, Communism, Secular Humanism, etc, disparaging, persecuting and even killing non-adherents is dogma. The author is doing a bit of that as well.

Christianity has a REAL difference there which held Western Civilization in really good stead -- "Love your neighbor as yourself". Now THAT is a REALLY different concept in a WV -- a damned inhuman one!

No matter what your WV, knowing you have one and trying to realize just how natural it seems, and how the Frames that you have picked up or had foisted on you force your brain down pre-determined paths. Magicians, marketers, politicians and many others know how to manipulate your WV and Frames -- you should know as well and understand what they are doing.

Don't even think of an elephant!

(bet ya did -- if not, please check in as not being human!)


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