Open Borders is a Disease

A medical mystery and a cause that the CDC is now allowed to diagnose.

By Daniel Greenfield @ Sultan Knish Blog 

Last month the CDC revealed that the number of babies born with syphilis had increased tenfold. The Centers for Disease Control blamed this on racism and inequity.

But the real issue isn’t racism even though the syphilis epidemic does affect minorities far more than white people. The number of babies born with ‘congenital syphilis’ did not rise from 365 in 1986, 529 in 2000 to 2,855 in 2021 because America was more racist in 2021 than in 1986.

In 2022, congenital syphilis shot up further to 3,700 resulting in 51 deaths and 231 stillbirths. Was America ten times more racist in 2022 than it had been in the eighties?

The federal health bureaucracy has put its top people on this medical mystery, dispatching Admiral Rick ‘Rachel’ Levine, a man whose claims to really be a woman rewarded him with an admiralship and a top health position in the Biden administration, to Georgia to promote a “sex positive harm reduction framework” and “LGBTQI+ health concerns”. What those concerns had to do with babies being born with syphilis to presumably heterosexual mothers was not addressed, but equity, if not the babies, were serviced by the transgender fake admiral.

In the 90s, the CDC unveiled a “National Plan to Eliminate Syphilis from the United States”. During the Obama administration the plan was finally abandoned far short of its original goal of reducing “cases to 1,000” and increasing “the number of syphilis-free counties to 90% by 2005.”

70% of the population now lives in counties with high syphilis rates. Not only have we not defeated syphilis, but the country is seeing the highest rates in 80 years.

It’s another triumph for the Biden administration which saw syphilis cases rise 26% in its first year. It’s a long way from the 90s when the CDC could optimistically argue that eliminating it was possible because “nationally, it is at the lowest rate ever recorded and it is confined to a very limited number of geographic areas.” It’s an accomplishment worse than Bidenomics.

What possible phenomenon could account for a massive increase in such a short time?

The number of syphilis cases doubled in Texas in five years. They’re up by 4,000 in just one year. What possible phenomenon in a border state might have caused such a drastic increase in so few years? Was it a sudden massive rise in racism or a massively open border?

In 2022, Texas reported 950 congenital syphilis cases accounting for nearly half the total in the entire country.

Arizona had the nation’s highest rate where the number of babies born with syphilis shot up from 17 in 2016 to 219 in 2022.

New Mexico had a 660% increase in congenital syphilis, for the second highest rate in the country for both syphilis and congenital syphilis, with 76 cases in 2022.

California is in sixth place where congenital syphilis cases rose 1,500% with 528 cases reported in 2019. “Hispanic babies made up nearly 50% of all cases” and the epicenter of the outbreak is in Fresno.

Who knows why the massive outbreak in congenital syphilis cases was clustered around border states during the same period when a mass migration of illegal aliens was underway.

You don’t have to be a public health expert to solve this one. It actually helps if you’re not.

None of the billions we spend on the CDC, the NIH and all the other acronym public health bureaucracies could explain why congenital syphilis in the Northeast only amounted to 121 cases in 2021, 296 cases in the Midwest, but 939 cases in the West and 1,499 cases in the South.

Why does Alabama have 37 cases while Arizona had 181 cases in 2021? What does Arizona have that Alabama lacks?

Racism, inequity or a border?

The CDC certainly has no idea and no clue how to solve this medical mystery. The experts have concluded that it’s a “socioeconomic problem”. Medical surveys have carried out groundbreaking research showing that congenital syphilis cases mostly involve poor minorities with low education levels living in rural areas. And therefore the answer is more social welfare.

“While newborn syphilis cases are increasing overall, babies born to black, Hispanic, or American Indian/Alaska Native mothers were up to 8 times more likely to have newborn syphilis in 2021 than babies born to white mothers,” the CDC argued. “Such disparities stem from decades of deeply entrenched social determinants of health that… result in health inequities such as higher rates of syphilis in some communities.”

This is the same rhetoric that the CDC has been deploying over the years including in its abandoned national plan to end syphilis. Despite all the funding allocated to testing and community outreach, all of which were supposed to solve “health inequities”, congenital syphilis rates tend to reflect overall syphilis rates, and syphilis rates reflect social stability.

Import millions of illegal alien migrants, most of them young men, and syphilis rates will spike.

In times of social upheaval, such as war, STD rates climb. Our current syphilis rates echo those of former eras such as the Great Depression or WWII when millions of men were displaced from home. The current syphilis spike isn’t caused by a war, or if it’s a war, it’s one that we’re losing.

The syphilis rates are the result of an invasion by millions of military age men. And the women brought along from south of the border or around the world. Some of the highest rates of previous syphilis exposure among pregnant women were found in high migrant countries like Venezuela and Haiti.

We don’t have to have crazy rates of a disease that, especially in newborns, could have been dealt with long ago. The cure was securing the border so millions of migrants couldn’t cross it.

Leandro Mena, the head of the CDC’s Division of STD Prevention, blamed the syphilis problem on stigma. “We, as a society, have a tremendous difficulty talking about sex and recognizing that sex is a normal activity and part of our human experience,”

The issue is not that we don’t talk about sex — we hardly talk about anything else. It’s that the experts and the public health bureaucrats pretend that syphilis outbreaks are caused by Americans being too puritanical to discuss where babies come from. Surely when sexuality studies are imposed on every kindergarten, this whole STD thing will finally go away.

But the CDC’s social welfare proposals are no substitute for a stable family life.

Syphilis rates are due to personal choices. They begin with parenthood. 64% of black children, 49% of American Indian, 42% of Latino and 24% of white children live in single parent households. The CDC refuses to consider the possibility that the same pyramid that governs single parent households is also reflected in syphilis cases including those of babies.

The issue is not that we don’t talk about sex; it’s that we don’t talk about family or the culture of nations. There is no stigma in talking about sex, but there is a stigma in talking about values or border security. The American family has gone on falling apart. Babies, killed in the womb or born with syphilis, are the collateral damage of a disastrous culture war. Flood the country with a mass invasion of people from failed states and the situation will get worse, not better.

It’s such a stigma that Mena won’t talk about it. Neither will anyone in the Biden administration.

We live in a society of mysteries that baffle the experts. Why does the public hate Bidenomics? Why do people think that there’s a lot of crime? Where is the inflation coming from? And why is there a sudden syphilis explosion? The usual answer to all of these questions is ‘racism’.

Why won’t Americans listen to the experts who can’t seem to ever find the “root cause” to any of the problems even when they’re staring them right in the face? It’s another mystery. The answer is probably “disinformation” with a side order of “racism”. Give the CDC a few billion and they’ll get to work on solving it.  

Daniel Greenfield is a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center. This article previously appeared at the Center's Front Page Magazine. Click here to subscribe to my articles. And click here to support my work with a donation. Thank you for reading.

Some Notes On The Trial Of Mann v. Steyn

January 27, 2024/ Francis Menton @ Manhattan Contrarian

Way back in October 2012, climate alarmist and activist Michael Mann brought a libel suit against Mark Steyn and Rand Simberg for allegedly defamatory blog posts that the two had written a few months previously. The case has gone through an incredible history of procedural twists and turns since then, a few of which I have covered in prior blog posts, for example here on March 20, 2014, and here on March 26, 2021. The trial finally started on January 16.

Probably most readers here are familiar with the case to at least some degree, and many may even be following the trial. (The court has a live feed available to the public. Follow this link at WattsUpWithThat if you want to tune in during the coming week.). I have watched some substantial chunks of the trial during its first two weeks.

Mann is best known as the creator of the famous “Hockey Stick” graph, purporting to be a world temperature reconstruction of the past thousand or so years, with essentially level temperatures until the 20th century, and then sharply rising temperatures in the 20th century era of human use of fossil fuels. Mann published versions of the figure in Nature magazine, originally in 1998; and the UN’s IPCC quickly (in 2001) seized on the Hockey Stick as its iconic demonstration that human use of fossil fuels was causing global warming. In the blog posts that are the subject of the case, Steyn and Simberg called Mann’s graph false and deceptive. (Steyn referred to Mann’s figure as “the fraudulent climate-change ‘hockey stick’ graph” while Simberg called out “[Mann’s] and others’ hockey stick deceptions.”) (Note: in multiple prior blog posts, I have also called Mann’s Hockey Stick graph fraudulent, for example here in August 2019.)

Truth is an absolute defense in a libel case, and Steyn has vowed to prove that his blog post was true. That would then mean that the Hockey Stick graph was indeed fraudulent. Many are therefore referring to this spectacle as “the Hockey Stick on trial.” And the Hockey Stick very much is on trial, at least as one of the issues in the case. However, if you have watched some of the proceedings — seven days’ worth so far — you are likely getting quite frustrated with how little the actual truth or falsity of the graph itself figures into the matter.

During most of the second week of trial, Michael Mann himself has been on the witness stand. He began by giving unenlightening and largely conclusory testimony that his Hockey Stick graph was not fraudulent. Then on Wednesday and Thursday he was under cross-examination, initially by a lawyer for Rand Simberg (Victoria Weatherford of Baker Hostetler). Steyn (who is doing his own cross-examination of witnesses) only got to start his cross after lunch on Thursday, and he was just reaching the issues of the Hockey Stick graph when 4:30 came and the trial adjourned for the weekend.

So what have they been talking about all that time without ever getting to the Hockey Stick? The answer is that there are plenty of other issues in a trial. One thing that is always an issue is the credibility of the plaintiff. And another issue that has taken up a good deal of time has been whether Mann has suffered any damages from the alleged defamation. On the issue of damages, Mann as plaintiff bears the burden of proof.

Let’s start with Mann’s credibility. It seems that when Mann commenced the case back in 2012, he put in his Complaint that he was a recipient of a Nobel Peace Prize, specifically for his work documenting the 20th century “rise in surface temperatures,” i.e., the Hockey Stick. Tony Heller at his Real Climate Science site has screenshots of portions of Mann’s original October 22, 2012 Complaint. The following is the text of paragraph 2 of the Complaint (emphasis added):

2. Dr. Mann is a climate scientist whose research has focused on global warming. Along with other researchers, he was one of the first to document the steady rise in surface temperatures during the 20th Century and the steep increase in measured temperatures since the 1950s. As a result of this research, Dr. Mann and his colleagues were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

Prior to the Complaint, Mann had also posted on his website a picture of what appeared to be a certificate from the Nobel Institute documenting Mann’s receipt of the Peace Prize. Heller has a screenshot of the document from Mann’s website, although I cannot find it there today. Apologies if the picture quality is not very good:

It turns out that the upper part of that picture is the actual Nobel Institute certificate; but the lower portion, including the text reading “Presented to Michael E. Mann for contributing to the award of the Nobel Peace Prize” was not part of anything generated by the Nobel Institute. Rather, it was fabricated by Mann.

Immediately after Mann filed his Complaint, a guy named Thomas Richard of the Washington Examiner communicated with Geir Lundestad, Director of the Nobel Institute, pointing out that Mann was claiming to have received a Nobel Prize, and asking if that was accurate. Richard promptly (October 26, 2012) received a communication back from Lundestad as follows:

1) Michael Mann has never been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

2) He did not receive any personal certificate. He has taken the diploma awarded in 2007 to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (and to Al Gore) and made his own text underneath this authentic-looking diploma.

3) The text underneath the diploma is entirely his own. We issued only the diploma to the IPCC as such. No individuals on the IPCC side received anything in 2007.

You can imagine how Steyn and the lawyers for Simberg are having a field day with this. In his testimony, Mann has attempted to spin this as an honest mistake — although somehow none of the other contributors to the IPCC made the same mistake of claiming that Nobel Prize was awarded personally to them, let alone created a forged Nobel Institute certificate. Mann has long since amended his Complaint to delete the claim that he is a Nobel Prize winner; but the original document remains in the court file of the case and cannot be made to disappear.

Then there is the issue of Mann’s many written acknowledgements thanking one Graham Spanier. Steyn spent most of Thursday afternoon confronting Mann on this issue.

If you don’t recognize Spanier’s name, here is some background. Graham Spanier became President of Penn State University in 1995, and was the President there when Mann was hired in 2005. In late 2009 there was a leak from the University of East Anglia in England of a large trove of emails in which Mann was a principal participant. The emails showed a close-knit group of prominent climate scientists engaging in what would appear from the face of the emails to be prima facie scientific misconduct — working to suppress all dissent from climate orthodoxy, controlling the peer review process in the main journals, and even discussing alterations of data in the context of the Hockey Stick graph itself. This collection of leaked emails came to be known as the “ClimateGate emails.”

Penn State’s administration, under Spanier, sprang into action to attempt to clear Mann. By February 2010, Penn State had stated that it found no evidence to support accusations against Mann; and on July 1, 2010 a special committee working under Spanier issued at report purporting to exonerate Mann of all wrongdoing.

Unfortunately for Mann, his scandal at Penn State took place contemporaneously with another scandal, also during the presidency of Spanier — that of long-time assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky. The Sandusky scandal became public in November 2011, upon Sandusky being indicted on 52 counts of child molestation that had occurred from 1994 to 2009. Sandusky, you will probably recall, had been an assistant football coach to long-time Penn State icon and hero Joe Paterno. Senior administrators at Penn State, including Spanier, had long known about accusations against Sandusky, and had been active participants in covering them up. After the November 2011 indictment, ex-FBI director Louis Freeh was brought in to do a full investigation of what had happened at Penn State, and he issued a scathing Report in July 2012, by which time Spanier had been forced to resign. Freeh’s Report was indeed the immediate impetus for the Simberg and Steyn blog posts that are the subject of the Mann v. Steyn lawsuit. From Steyn’s post:

[W]hen the East Anglia emails came out, Penn State felt obliged to “investigate” Professor Mann. Graham Spanier, the Penn State president forced to resign over Sandusky, was the same cove who investigated Mann. And, as with Sandusky and Paterno, the college declined to find one of its star names guilty of any wrongdoing.

Over the years since 2012, things have gotten steadily worse for Spanier. First he was forced to resign as President. Then he himself was indicted for obstruction of justice and other charges. Then he was facing trial. Then he was tried and convicted. And then he was given a long prison sentence. That’s where he is today.

Through all this, Michael Mann has written about one book about every 2 to 3 years. And each of them has thanked Graham Spanier in the acknowledgements. That may have been excusable back in 2012, when Spanier had just been accused of misconduct, but not yet indicted or convicted himself. But Steyn showed that Mann had continued to acknowledge Spanier through each stage of the process, including most recently in a book published in 2023.

Meanwhile, Ms. Weatherford devoted most of her cross to issues of damages. You might think that this would be rather dry stuff, and it is, but Mann never ceases to astonish with his audacity. Most notably, Mann’s principal theory of damages today appears to be that as a result of the claimed defamation, and the harm to his reputation, he has lost out on various government grants that he otherwise would have received. But it turns out that during the discovery process in the case Simberg’s lawyers demanded from Mann a list of all grants that he claimed he lost as a result of the defamation. Mann responded by objecting, saying that the information requested was “irrelevant to any issue in the case,” and not listing a single grant allegedly lost. Ms. Weatherford confronted Mann with his answers and made him acknowledge his signature under oath at the end of the document. Mann’s excuse for this answer was that his lawyers had advised him to give this response. How Mann can claim damages from lost grants after giving this answer, I have no idea.

So as I said earlier, when the trial adjourned at 4:30 on Thursday, Steyn had just begun his cross-examination on the subject of the Hockey Stick chart itself. That will now start up at 9:30 on Monday morning, and promises to be quite entertaining. For a preview of what might get covered, here is my blog post on the case from March 29, 2021, on the occasion of one of the many substantive motions briefed in the case. Mark Steyn had submitted a brief on March 3, outlining some of the evidence he had accumulated, much from the ClimateGate emails, as to the fraudulence of the Hockey Stick. Here, via my post, is an excerpt from that brief:

The [Hockey Stick graph as published in the IPCC’s Third Assessment Report in 2001, in a portion written by lead author Mann] omitted tree ring proxy data collected by climate scientist Keith Briffa that showed a decline in temperatures after 1960, a message inconsistent with the prized hockey stick shape. . . . The IPCC TAR did not disclose the deletion of this data. . . . As lead author, Mann decided to omit the Briffa data without the input of his other lead authors.. . . Mann’s own collaborators cautioned him against the deletion. IPCC TAR Coordinating Lead Author Chris Folland wrote to Mann that Briffa’s data “contradicts the multiproxy curve and dilutes the message rather significantly.”. . . Briffa himself urged Mann not to succumb to “pressure to present a nice tidy story” by “ignor[ing]” his post-1960 results. . . . Mann agreed with them on the merits but bemoaned the data’s political impact: “[I]f we show Keith’s series . . . skeptics [will] have a field day.” . . . To prevent a “skeptics’ field day,” he chose to delete the data.

So we await the continuation of Steyn’s cross on Monday morning.

P&D and The Week That Was

Truth is the Sublime Convergence of History and Reality

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De Omnibus Dubitandum (Everything is to be questioned)

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 This Link will take you to My Commentaries.  This Link will take you to My Commentaries by topic.  This Link will take you to My Global Warming Commentaries

 By Rich Kozlovich

Paul Driessen is a friend who has been involved in standing up against the junk science of the green movement for decades.  Whether it's been pesticides, genetically modified foods, energy production, or global warming, he's been in the forefront of that battle to end the insanity of the leftist lies and delusions being imposed on humanity.  He regularly one such article is listed below, and usually with a prologue.  He states:

Our lives, livelihoods and living standards are increasingly dictated by political, bureaucratic, academic and media elites. This is happening most ominously and dangerously on climate change and energy.  Fabricated and exaggerated claims about “dangerous manmade climate cataclysms” are used to justify destroying the reliable, affordable energy systems we have – and replacing them with expensive, weather-dependent, land-intensive wind, solar and battery systems that would require mining, ore processing and manufacturing on scales that would destroy wildlife habitats, scenic vistas and agricultural lands across the globe.

If all that fails, these ruling elites plan to dictate the kind and size of homes we can live in, how warm and cool we can keep them, how often we can fly, and nearly every other aspect of our lives.  As my article notes, that’s what this year’s elections are really about. Thank you for posting my article, quoting from it, and forwarding it to your friends and colleagues.

The corruption in the media has always been an issue with me.  So, this week I've posted some articles dealing with the demise of the mainstream media, both electronic and print, and make no mistake, this is wide spread and growing, and has been in the works for some years.  Nitwit billionaires bought loser left wing mouth pieces to keep the river of leftist lies and propaganda flowing, but no one wanted to read them, advertising is drying up, and in point of fact, the internet has changed advertising in dramatic ways, so they're losing money hand over fist.  How do people that stupid become billionaires?   

And the electronic networks can no longer control what people watch on TV.

These leftist media mouth pieces have been exposed for their lies, their corruption, their treason, and that's been massive.   

While an American social paradigm is being entirely too trustworthy, and as a result we can be easily fooled, once made aware of how they've been deceived, Americans will not forget or forgive.  

These leftist propagandist employees are heading to the permanent unemployment line because AI is coming to these big corporate institutions, at least as long as they last, and we can only hope it won't be that much longer.  

I had a large stash of draft media files, and I've decided to purge those files......so.....  there will be a list of articles linked to P&D, and those not linked to P&D for your perusal.  Also, my

My Commentaries

1. Kakistocracy: We are Ruled by Charlatans, Knaves, and Fools: Part VI, Who Are The Fascists
2. Kakistocracy: We are Ruled by Charlatans, Knaves, and Fools, Part V
3. Kakistocracy: We are Ruled by Charlatans, Knaves, and Fools, Part IV
4. Appeasing the Crocodile To Protect "Our" Democracy
5. Harbinger of Things to Come, Part II
6. We Have Nothing to Fear But Fear Itself
7. Is it the Drugs? It Must Be the Drugs!
8. My Gazette: Deep State Corruption
9. New Hampshire: End of the Line!

Commentaries

1. Climate and energy fantasy and tyranny By Paul Driessen
2. Mann v Steyn (and us) By John Droz Jr.
3. GOP Rallies Behind Texas Governor Greg Abbott at the Border By James Fite
4. The Domestic Terrorists of Tomorrow are Blocking Traffic Today By Daniel Greenfield
5. Black Puppeteer Sues for Being Accused of Blackface During Black History Month  By Daniel Greenfield
6. Transgender Activists Hijacked the ADA's Disability Protections to Threaten Women  By Daniel Greenfield
7. Biden’s Taiwan Betrayal By Daniel Greenfield
8. Patriot Neighbors: Definition Leads to Clarity. Clarity Lead to Understanding! By Robin Itzler
9. The Demise of the Electric Vehicle – A Whodunnit With a Shocking Twist By John Klar
10. Little Hope For Fixing New York's Housing Situation Any Time Soon By Francis Menton
11. Markers Along The Road To The Death Of Net Zero By Francis Menton
12. Meet the Economist NPR Interviewed to Explain Why America’s $34 Trillion Debt Is Definitely Not a Problem By Jon Miltimore
13. The CPI-X Spending Cap By Dan Mitchell
14. A State Suicide Pact, Part II By Dan Mitchell
15. Kenya Crashes on the Laffer Curve By Dan Mitchell
16. Why Is Someone at AEI Proposing a Massive Tax Increase to Finance Ever-Growing Government, Part II? By Dan Mitchell
17. Fed Forcing Banks to Take Emergency Loans – Swamponomics By Andrew Moran
18. Biden Team Failed to Track $1 Billion in Ukraine Aid By Dave Patterson
19. Feudalism--updated By Mike Shaw

Links

2024 Election

1. DeSantis Gives Up, Throws His Support to Trump 

America's Cities   

1. America’s Once Great Cities Are Being Turned Into Open Sewers
   

Economics

1. Clashing Crises

Media Corruption and Collapse

1. Another Major Media Outlet Goes Bust, Vice files for bankruptcy
2. Which matters more to the New York Times: The First Amendment, or protecting Democrats?
3. 50% of Americans Says the Media Deliberately Misleads
4. Disgraced CNN Hits All-Time Weekend Ratings Low
5. The L.A. Times is dying, and only Donald Trump can save it
6. Nolte: Far-left L.A. Times Slashes 20 Percent of Staff
7. Hundreds of Vogue, Vanity Fair, Condé Nast Union Members Launch 24-Hour Walkout Amid Layoff Talks
8. The Media Is Drowning, And No One Cares

Media Corruption and Collapse, Unpublished Links

1. Why Is the New York Times Urging America to Buddy up With Communist China?
2. New York Times beclowns itself with its latest prediction of climate doom
3. The press has itself to blame
4. WSJ's claws come out for Ron DeSantis
5. NYT op-ed denouncing ‘disgrace’ of American poverty wears blinkers
6. The Democrat-Media Bipartisanship Fallacy 
7. George Soros has an enormous, dangerous reach in the American media 
8. Riffed From The Headlines: Continuing The 2022 Media Mayhem Honors - Part 2
9. Attack of the Megalomaniacal News Media 

Constant as the North Star

Another Major Media Outlet Goes Bust, Vice files for bankruptcy

By Polly Davis Doig, May 2, 2023 Updated May 15, 2023 

Vice filed for bankruptcy as expected Monday morning, the latest large media company to go under. In this case, it appears that a group of Vice lenders including Soros Fund Management and Fortress Investment Group will attempt the buy the company with a credit bid of $225 million, reports CNBC. All of which cements "Vice’s status among the most notable bad bets in the media industry," per the New York Times. 

The former digital powerhouse is known for sites including Vice, Motherboard, and Refinery29. Vice, the media company that went from a Montreal punk magazine more than 20 years ago to a juggernaut with a $5.7 billion valuation, is the latest member of the Fourth Estate to be on the brink of going belly up. The New York Times, citing three "people with knowledge" but not authorization to blab publicly, reports the company is currently shopping for a buyer but preparing for bankruptcy in the event that doesn't happen. ..........To Read More...

Which matters more to the New York Times: The First Amendment, or protecting Democrats?

March 16, 2023 By David Zukerman

Gail Collins and Bret Stephens have no problem with the tyrannical mindset of House Democrats.  This fact was brought home in their weekly Tuesday colloquy on the propaganda (formerly editorial) page of The New York Times, March 14.  The usual suspects that day included Tucker Carlson and — how could it be otherwise? — Donald J. Trump. But did they have a hint of criticism for House Judiciary Committee Democrats who badgered journalists Matt Taibbi and Michael Shellenberger?  .............At the very least, couldn't they have cackled over this bizarre remark from the bizarre Rep. Wasserman Schultz of Florida, as reported by the Daily Mail?

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) joined in the Democratic tarnishing of Taibbi's reporting because he agreed to testify. "'Being a Republican witness today certainly casts a cloud over your objectivity,' she said.............To Read More....

50% of Americans Says the Media Deliberately Misleads

Only 25% believe that the mainstream media are not out to lie to them.

March 17, 2023

We have an absolutely corrupt and incompetent man as president who is actively destroying America with radical, extreme policies and massive taxpayer money to political supporters, and most of the media cheer about how great his policies are. In the last 5 years, the media claimed that we were in a crisis of “misinformation” and appointed themselves as the nation’s fact checkers, censoring social media and determining what people could and couldn’t say. Awkwardly, very few Americans trust the media and 50% believe the media is lying to them.

Fifty percent of Americans feel most national news organizations intend to mislead, misinform or persuade the public.

Those are ugly numbers. Worse still, only 25% believe that national news organizations, aka the mainstream media, are not out to lie to them.  Those same 25% say that national news organizations care about their best interests. 52% disagree............... More

Disgraced CNN Hits All-Time Weekend Ratings Low

John Nolte 20 Sep 2023

CNN, a far-left propaganda outlet that spreads conspiracy theories and violence, hit an all-time weekend ratings low. The New York Post:

Ratings-challenged CNN hit rock bottom in a key viewership demographic last weekend — another sign of the difficulties facing incoming boss Mark Thompson. The cable news network logged its worst weekend ratings on record in the all-important 25- to 54-year-old demo, according to the latest Nielsen data released Tuesday. CNN — which launched in 1980 and bills itself as “the most trusted name in news” — totaled just 55,000 viewers for its weekend slate of shows that include Sunday political programs “State of the Union with Jake Tapper and Dana Bash,” and “Fareed Zakaria GPS.”

Even CNNLOL’s weekend primetime shows, The Whole Story with Anderson Cooper and Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy, attracted only 43,000 demo viewers. These are the worst ratings since 1991, which is as far back as ratings data is available..........To Read More...

Editor's Note:  This is CNN and the entire leftist Media in action:

• Russia Collusion Hoax
• Hands Up, Don’t Shoot Hoax
• Jussie Smollett Hoax
• Covington KKKids Hoax
• Very Fine People Hoax
• Seven-Hour Gap Hoax
• Russian Bounties Hoax
• Trump Trashes Troops Hoax
• Policemen Killed at Mostly Peaceful January 6 Protest Hoax
• Rittenhouse Hoax
• Eating While Black Hoax
• Border Agents Whipping Illegals Hoax
• NASCAR Noose Hoax
• The Georgia Jim Crow 2.0 Hoax
• Trump Assaulted Secret Service Agents and Grabbed Steering Wheel of Beast Hoax
• MAGA Assaulted Paul Pelosi Hoax
• COVID Lab Leak Theory Is Racist Hoax
• Hunter Biden’s Laptop Is Russian Disinformation Hoax
• Joe Biden Will Never Ban Gas Stoves Hoax
• COVID Deaths are Over-Counted Is a Conspiracy Theory Hoax

 

The L.A. Times is dying, and only Donald Trump can save it

Jordan Schachtel Jan 23, 2024 

At the beginning of the Trump era, The L.A. Times saw a 100% year-over-year increase in newspaper subscriptions. Now they're losing $40 million a year. The corporate media needs their Bad Guy back. There’s only one man who can save the jobs of the hive media minds who remain employed by The Los Angeles Times, and it’s not who they think it is..........To Read More.....

My Take - I don't agree with this author's analysis.  While a Trump Presidency may give them a boost, no one can save these corrupt institutions.  They've been exposed for their lies, their corruption, their treason, and while American can be easily fooled, once made aware of how they've been deceived, American will not forget or forgive.  They might be able to fool the younger generation for a while, but they don't read newspapers, books, or anything that make their little snowflake heads ache with critical thought.  End result will be the same. 

Nolte: Far-left L.A. Times Slashes 20 Percent of Staff

John Nolte 23 Jan 2024

The failing Los Angeles Times announced Tuesday the slashing of 20 percent of its staff, which adds up to 115 job cuts. This loss for the L.A. Times will undoubtedly be a community college boon throughout the Southland for computer coding classes.  “The [far-left] Los Angeles Times announced Tuesday that it was laying off at least 115 people — or more than 20% of the newsroom,” the Los Angeles Times reports. This represents “one of the largest workforce reductions in the history of the 142-year-old [disgraced] institution.” 

The report adds that the “move comes amid projections for another year of heavy losses for the newspaper.”  And now we come to my favorite part:

The cuts were necessary because the paper could no longer lose $30 million to $40 million a year without making progress toward building higher readership that would bring in advertising and subscriptions to sustain the organization, the paper’s owner, Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, said Tuesday.

Hahahaha… This a'hole’s writing $3 million-plus checks every month to produce a newspaper no bigger than Applebee’s menu.............The corporate media is pure evil. While I wish no physical harm on anyone, bankruptcy, humiliation, and unemployment all put a smile on my face and a song in my heart..............To Read More

Hundreds of Vogue, Vanity Fair, Condé Nast Union Members Launch 24-Hour Walkout Amid Layoff Talks

Alana Mastrangelo 23 Jan 2024 

 Hundreds of Vogue, Vanity Fair, and Condé Nast union members staged a 24-hour walkout on Tuesday amid layoffs. The walkout, in protest of bargaining practices the union says are unlawful, is being held outside Condé Nast’s headquarters in New York City, according to a report by TheWrap. The media giant’s brands include Vanity Fair, Vogue, Teen Vogue, and GQ, among many others.  “Hey-hey, Ho-ho! Corporate greed has got to go!” protestors could be heard chanting in video footage of the walkout posted on Tuesday morning.............“We hope that management is ready to be a good faith partner in these negotiations moving forward,” DeCarava added. “If not, our members are more than ready to take whatever action is necessary to protect jobs.”........To Read More....

My Take - Hey-hey, Ho-Ho, watch your jobs go, go, go.   It won't be long before we stat seeing these nitwits in the unemployment line, permanently, and my view will be......SCHADENFREUDE! AI is coming to these big corporate institutions, at least as long as they last anyway.  And we can only hope it won't be that much longer. 

The Media Is Drowning, And No One Cares

Matt Vespa  |  January 26, 2024 

 I wish I could say it’s a proper market correction because people were tired of their lies and fake news narratives being published, but it’s not. It might partially be due to that, but the ad bubble burst, and those days will never return. The liberal media is bleeding all over, with some newsrooms being decimated over revenue issues. As Axios wrote this morning, it’s a “bloodbath.”

We saw the first signs of this in the early 2010s when news outlets began curbing local beats. Again, the gravy train was at its high point then, so most companies probably thought they could tread water, shifting all their energy to national news stories. Alas, nothing lasts forever. The LA Times has gutted one-third of its newsroom, with another 100-plus layoffs being announced on Tuesday. Time Magazine, Sports Illustrated, and The Washington Post stare at disaster. While the revenue issue is the first blow, the unionization of staff writers and employees at these outlets isn’t helping (via Axios):....To Read More....

GOP Rallies Behind Texas Governor Greg Abbott at the Border

The standoff between the Lone Star State and Biden's border patrol continues – and America is taking sides.

by James Fite | Jan 26, 2024 @ Liberty Nation News Tags: Articles, Illegal Immigration, Law

Despite a Supreme Court ruling that federal agents are allowed – for now – to cut the wire and re-open the border, the standoff between Texas and the Biden administration continues. Governor Greg Abbott isn’t backing down, and the GOP is standing with him. But who actually “owns” the land, regardless of what the deeds say? Who has the ultimate authority along the border, even on state- and privately-owned ground?

America Takes Sides

A group of 24 Republican governors released a statement Thursday, January 25, supporting Governor Abbott’s claim that Texas has a “constitutional right to self-defense.” While the state remains embroiled in a legal battle with the Biden administration – which the Supreme Court has yet to decide, despite the short-term ruling issued Monday – Governor Abbott has kept Shelby Park in Eagle Pass, a popular corridor for illegal immigration, locked down with the Texas National Guard and the Texas State Police. Rows of razor wire line the border – and more is being added after the High Court said federal agents could continue their task of clearing it away. Border Patrol, however, still isn’t allowed in the park.

Of the 27 GOP governors in the US, only three didn’t sign on to this letter: Idaho’s Brad Little, Vermont’s Phil Scott, and Greg Abbott himself – who, of course, might have come away looking a bit silly had he signed a letter that declares he stands behind himself.

Former President – and current GOP front-runner – Donald Trump also spoke up for Governor Abbott, as did independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Senator John Kennedy (R-LA).

That Trump supports Abbott against both Joe Biden the man and illegal immigration the issue comes as no surprise. “Those Biden let in should not get comfortable because they will be going home,” he posted on Truth Social. Support from former Democrat RFK, Jr., on the other hand, may have shocked some – though perhaps it shouldn’t, given his recent campaign positions and that he’s running against Biden as well as Trump.

“Texas is right. Biden’s failure to secure the border leaves states no choice but to take matters into their own hands,” Kennedy posted on X. “As President, I will end this humanitarian crisis once and for all. I will secure the border and destroy the business model of the drug cartels. A country without borders is not a country at all.”

Sen. John Kennedy, on the other hand, approached the subject from a more economic angle. “Pres. Biden’s failed border policies have wreaked havoc in every corner of our country, including Louisiana,” he tweeted. “According to one estimate, Louisianians pay an additional $4,613 PER illegal migrant – that’s about $604 MILLION per year – in state taxes because of illegal immigration.”

The left, of course, accuses Abbott – and Republicans in general – of interfering with the federal government just for the sake of making hay over the immigration issue leading up to Election Day. Some even go so far as to advocate Biden federalize the Texas National Guard and take control by force.

The Texas Border – Who Owns It?

The final paragraph of Section 10 of the US Constitution reads:

“No State shall, without the Consent of Congress, lay any Duty of Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of Peace, enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a foreign Power, or engage in War, unless invaded, or in such imminent Danger as will not admit of delay.”

Note that there are three caveats to the rule that states won’t do these various things. First, Congress could give permission. Second, the state might be invaded. And third, the state could face “imminent Danger as will not admit of delay.” That last item is vague – likely intentionally so – and allows plenty of room for interpretation (presumably the courts’ job) in case something other than an actual invasion threatened a state immediately enough as to leave no time to consult Congress before acting.

(Photo by John Moore/Getty Images)

Since the Constitution says states can’t do these things without meeting one or more of those exceptions, a strict reading reveals that, in the presence of such a circumstance, they can.

So, if the flow of migrants illegally crossing the border can be legitimately considered an invasion, then Governor Abbott does, in fact, have the constitutional right to do any and all of the otherwise forbidden things in that paragraph, including defend his state by force of arms.

It’s clear, then, that Governor Abbott didn’t just pull this idea out of the ether; it rests upon a firm and logical constitutional foundation – assuming, of course, it’s reasonable to call what’s happening in Texas an invasion.

A Question of Supremacy

The question, then, is who has the supreme claim to the “supreme law of the land”? The Biden administration has been cutting the razor wire seemingly for no reason other than to allow illegal immigrants to cross. The president’s policy is that – despite his own claims otherwise – the border is open, and the US government won’t stop people from crossing. So, who gets to define the issue? Are hordes of immigrants coming to America in a way that’s perfectly acceptable to the Biden administration’s policies, or is a besieged Texas facing an invasion it must fight off because the federal government simply won’t?

It came to the US Supreme Court justices to decide that question. And, while they didn’t (surprise, surprise), they did issue a short-term ruling on Monday, January 22, that allows the Biden administration to cut the wire. This decision overturned the injunction put in place by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, which forbade federal agents from cutting wire on state or private land, but it is not the answer to the big question. That will, presumably, come later. As Liberty Nation Legal Affairs Editor Scott D. Cosenza, Esq. explained:

“The ruling doesn’t make a final decision on the facts; it is only about what actions are allowed while the case is making its way through the courts …… Now, the case returns to a hearing on the merits in the district court, presumably an appeal before the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, and another go at the Supreme Court.”

“This is not over,” Governor Abbott declared after the Supreme Court, at least temporarily, took Biden’s side. In fact, with Donald Trump rallying Congress on the border and GOP governors uniting, it may be just the beginning.

 

Read More From James Fite

Kakistocracy: We are Ruled by Charlatans, Knaves, and Fools: Part VI, Who Are The Fascists

Kakistocracy is a system of government run by the least suitable or competent citizens of a state!

By Rich Kozlovich

(Editor's Note:  This is Part VI in this ongoing series.  Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V. You may wish to view my entire kakistocracy file, which will include the articles from this series, and twelve more.  More are on the way. RK)

There are terms I keep seeing being touted by Democrats calling conservatives extremists, and fascists.  I wonder two things.  Have they ever read a history book, and do they even know what the definition of fascism actually is.

Well, here it is, and it starts out with a definition that's only partially correct saying:

Fascism (/ˈfæʃɪzəm/ FASH-iz-əm) is a far-right, authoritarian, ultranationalist political ideology and movement, characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hierarchy, subordination of individual interests for the perceived.

Fascism isn't right of anything except communism, and defining it in this way is an attempt to besmirch conservatives.   What fascism represents is far left on everything, and it's only to the right of communism.  Fascism and communism are two sides of the same coin, socialism, and both are leftist in character and action "characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hierarchy, subordination of individual interests for the perceived".

Benito Mussolini, a fascist socialist stated: "Everything within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state"?  So, what party is constantly promoting government control over our lives, including what we should eat?  Democrats!

The Democrat party "[has] been largely devoured and directed by its socialist and communist-leaning members. It also encompasses various anarchist and fascist—fascists are leftists—branches such as BLM, Antifa and other charming social organizations, though they’re a bit more overt in their destructive designs."

If the Democrat party is the party of freedom, and hates fascism, why then did Democrat Congresswoman Barbara Lee, a "communist sympathizer who was a personal friend to Fidel Castro" whine because she couldn't interrupt a committee hearing to defend Castro, a greater mass murderer per ratio than Stalin?  

"Whining that she was “silenced” in her promotion of the Communist dictatorship by a daughter of Cuban refugees." 

Was it the Democrats or the Republicans who violated House rules over the January 6 kangaroo court House committee membership? Then when we look at the activity of that committee we see more fascist corruption:

The Department of Justice’s prosecution of a group of Oath Keepers was one of the centerpieces of the Democrats’ effort to build the January 6 protest into an “insurrection.” It worked: the Oath Keeper defendants were convicted and sentenced to up to 18 years in prison.  Now investigative journalist Steve Baker of Blaze News has pieced together security camera footage released by the House Republican majority that, he says, proves that a key witness for the government in the Oath Keepers trial–Nancy Pelosi’s head of security–committed perjury."

Remember, the Committee had that evidence and kept it hidden and refused to release it.  Why?  Because they knew, or should have known, this January 6th event wasn't an insurrection, and the committee hearing was all a gigantic corrupt political scam, and this was perjured testimony.  In effect allowing corruption of the justice system, deliberately, promoting corruption of the rule of law, just like every leftist government that ever existed.  That was the Democrats.

These Davos meetings are the most telling, as Gary Gidler notes in his article, Davos: From Proto-Fascism to Post-Fascism, saying:

The Davos gatherings are a microcosm of what the Left has in mind for the rest of the world. .........The story of the proto-fascist policies of Richelieu demonstrates the theme observable in all future left-wing economies: a short-term boost in economic activity due to crushing, inescapable state intervention, and then, in the long run, unavoidable decline and stagnation. As it is known, the Soviet Union, Nazi Germany, Cuba, Venezuela, and the entire Soviet bloc post-World War II followed this course. The demise of Communist China is inevitable for the same reason. A similar fate is awaiting the Davos Oracles of “stakeholder capitalism.” From that outlook, all four of Dumas’s three musketeers were the first proto-anti-fascists.  State-managed “stakeholder capitalism” was known in the 1600s as mercantilism. To use 21st-century terminology, Cardinal Richelieu established a form of stakeholder capitalism in France, where the government served as the only principal stakeholder.

Who are the biggest supporters of all this?  Democrats!

The newly elected President of Argentina,  Javier Milei Warns Davos to Abandon Socialism:  The West in in Danger:

Argentine President Javier Milei delivered an address fiercely condemning socialism at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, on Wednesday, rejecting the “radical feminist” and “environmental”  agendas fueled by socialism as well. Milei urged world leaders to embrace capitalism as an alternative.  Milei, a libertarian economist, explained in a roughly 20-minute speech how socialism ultimately leads to poverty, how the state “is not the solution,” but rather “the problem itself,” and how leftism has co-opted Western government institutions to further its agendas. Wednesday’s speech was Milei’s first international address since taking office in December.

What party wants to destroy capitalism and impose unlimited government control over the economy and death of the nation via collectivism?  The Democrats!  And just how well have they done with what they're already controlling?  On January 16, 2024 Jack Hellner published this piece, Media operatives peddle ‘strong economy’ narrative but include contradicting facts saying:

It is absolute disinformation for the WSJ to tell the public that the big banks profits went up because of a strong economy. It is a shame that the news pages of the WSJ are no better than the WaPo, NYT, and other media outlets as they campaign for Joe Biden.  It is no wonder that the public has so little respect for, or trust in, what supposed journalists write or report. They are mostly pushing the Democrat agenda to remake or destroy the greatest, most prosperous, and most free country that has ever existed.

Is it Democrats or Conservatives who subscribes to this idea the world's wealth should be confiscated and distributed according to their whims, and all done by a:

"religious cult masquerading as scientific discipline" they're falsely calling "climate science”, seeking to "employ climate modeling to reallocate wealth and solve the moral conundrum of human inequality “paradigm shifting” plan for “environmental redistributionism” (a.k.a., ecosocialism).".........This distillation of the Green New Deal into the guise of scientific study is a bait-and-switch too far.  

The more climate ideology steers humans toward grand schemes of totalitarian domination, the more apparently disconnected from established liberties and traditional scientific methods it becomes. The climate priests of woke theocracy are polluting science in the name of ending pollution............ The environment has become the Marxist Trojan horse through which the government seizes all power over all humanity.

Leftist/fascists "promote authoritarianism, dictatorial leadership, centralized autocracy, suppression of opposition, belief in a social hierarchy, centralized autocracy, and forcible  subordination of individual rights."  So, who are the fascists, Democrats, or Conservatives? 

Climate and energy fantasy and tyranny

Models, myths and misinformation on climate drive models, myths and misinformation on energy

Paul Driessen

It’s mystifying and terrifying that our lives, livelihoods and living standards are increasingly dictated by activist, political, bureaucratic, academic and media ruling elites, who disseminate theoretical nonsense, calculated myths and outright disinformation.

Not only on pronouns, gender and immigration – but on climate change ... and energy, the foundation of modern civilization and life spans.

We’re constantly told the world will plunge into an existential climate cataclysm if average planetary temperatures rise another few tenths of a degree, due to using fossil fuels for reliable, affordable energy, raw materials for over 6,000 vital products, and lifting billions out of poverty, disease and early death.

Climate alarmism implicitly assumes Earth’s climate was stable until coal, oil and gas emissions knocked it off kilter ... and would be stable again if people stopped using fossil fuels.

In the real world, climate has changed numerous times, often dramatically, sometimes catastrophically, and always naturally. Multiple ice ages and interglacial periods, Roman and Medieval warm periods, a Little Ice Age, major floods, droughts and dust bowls all actually happened – long before fossil fuels.

Data for tornados, hurricanes and other extreme weather events prove they are not getting more frequent or intense. You might argue that Harvey and Irma marked a sudden increase in major hurricanes in 2017 – but that’s only because after Wilma there’d been a record twelve years of zero Category 3-5 hurricanes.

We need to ignore the fear-mongering, look at actual historic records, and recognize that more dangerous, unprecedented calamities upward trends simply aren’t there. We need to insist that alarmists distinguish and quantify human influences versus natural forces for recent temperature, climate and weather events – and show when, where and how human activities replaced natural forces. They haven’t done so.

The only place manmade temperature and climate catastrophes exist is in Michael Mann and other GIGO computer models. These climate models are worthless for policymaking because they aren’t verified by actual measurements, don’t account for urban heat island effects, and cannot incorporate the vast scale and complexity of atmospheric, planetary and galactic forces that determine Earth’s climate.

In reality, people and planet are threatened far more by global cooling than warming. Even a couple degrees drop in average global temperatures would drastically reduce growing seasons, arable land, plant growth, wildlife habitats and agricultural output – especially if it’s accompanied by reductions in plant-fertilizing atmospheric carbon dioxide levels. Plants, animals and people would face starvation.

We’re also told ruling elites could prevent this imagined crisis by switching us to wind, solar and battery power. (They also want to eliminate cows and modern agriculture, over misplaced concerns about methane and fertilizer, but that’s anudder discussion.)

Build a coal, gas or nuclear power plant – and unless governments shut it down or cut off fuel supplies, the plant provides plentiful, reliable, affordable electricity nearly 24/7/365 for decades. Build a massive sprawling wind or solar installation, and you have to back up every kilowatt with coal, gas or nuclear power – or with millions of huge batteries – for every windless, sunless period.

The economic and ecological effects would be ruinous.

Coal, gas and nuclear plants can be built close to electricity-intensive urban centers. Tens of thousands of wind turbines and billions of solar panels must go where there’s good wind and sunshine, far from urban areas, connected by high voltage transmission lines. In fact, for Net Zero, says the International Energy Agency (IEA), the world would need 50,000,000 miles of new and upgraded transmission lines by 2040!

All those “clean, green, renewable, sustainable, affordable” wind, solar and battery systems, backup generators, transmission lines and electric vehicles would require millions of tons of iron, copper, aluminum, manganese, cobalt, lithium, concrete, plastics and numerous other metals and minerals.

Onshore wind turbines require nine times more materials per megawatt – and offshore turbines need fourteen times more – than a combined-cycle natural gas power plant, the IEA calculates. Solar panels and EVs have the same problem.

To get these materials, billions of tons of overlying rock must be removed to reach billions of tons of ores – which then must be processed in huge industrial facilities that use mercury and toxic chemicals ... emit vast quantities of greenhouse gases and toxic pollutants ... and are powered by coal or natural gas. Many components for these “green” technologies are derived from oil and natural gas.

US and other Western facilities control and recycle these pollutants. Chinese and Russian facilities pay little attention to air and water pollution, workplace safety, or fossil fuel use, efficiency and emissions – yet they supply over 80% of “renewable” energy raw materials, because the West increasingly bans mining and processing and makes energy prohibitively expensive to operate mines and factories.

Pseudo-renewable energy worldwide would cost hundreds of trillions of dollars, would have to be subsidized by trillions of taxpayer dollars, and would dramatically increase electricity rates.

Electric vehicle, appliance and heating mandates would double or triple all these infrastructure, materials, mining and land use requirements, ecological impacts and costs.

American residential electricity prices in 2023 ranged from 10.4¢ per kilowatt-hour (Idaho) to 28.4¢ per kWh (California). British families paid 47¢ per kWh! UK factories and businesses paid up to three times what their US counterparts did. German families, factories and businesses are in the same capsizing boat.

But EU industrial leaders say energy prices must continue rising, to cover the soaring costs of the “energy transition.” If they don’t, factories, jobs and emissions will move overseas. But if they do, families will freeze jobless in the dark.

What many call the Climate Industrial Complex has a monumental stake in perpetuating this situation. Collectively, its members have incredible power, control much of government and education, hold enormous financial stakes in green tech subsidies, and often censor contrarian viewpoints.

Just as ominous, if it becomes clear that the Brave New World of Net Zero Energy cannot provide sufficient affordable electricity and other necessities for modern industries, healthcare and living standards, two-thirds of America’s ruling elites favor food and energy rationing to combat climate change and retain their anti-capitalism, anti-growth agenda. It’s likely the same in Europe and Canada.

The Biden Administration and other governments are already dictating the kinds of vehicles we can drive and what appliances and heating systems we can use. They’re already exploring ways to limit the kind and size of homes we can live in, how warm and cool we can keep them, how often we can travel by air, the kinds and amounts of meat we can eat, and many other aspects of our lives.

Meanwhile, China, India, Indonesia and dozens of other countries are building hundreds of coal and gas generating units – further underscoring the insanity and futility of trying to control energy sources, quantities and emissions.

This is what America’s 2024 state and national elections are about – and elections in Europe, Canada, Australia and elsewhere. The longer these elites remain in power, the more our liberties, lives and living standards will resemble life a century ago under authoritarian regimes. Vote accordingly.

Paul Driessen is a senior policy advisor for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (www.CFACT.org) and author of books and articles on energy, environmental, and human rights issues.