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De Omnibus Dubitandum - Lux Veritas

Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Observations From the Back Row: 8-31-11

...
“De Omnibus Dubitandum”

Video with John Stossel and Richard Tren regarding DDT
A complete list of things caused by global warming

Everything we are told should bear some resemblance to what we see going on in reality!
______________________________________

Economist Paul Krugman took to the pages of The New York Times on Sunday in order to regurgitate Sierra Club talking points regarding global warming and to castigate the Republican Party for being “anti-science.” As Roger Simon noted, like just about everybody else writing about the issue, Krugman doesn’t bother to explain or understand the science or the nature of the robust scientific debate that has been going on for some time. Instead, he relies on the Left’s preferred method for analyzing scientific issues: a moistened finger held up to the wind.

“Don’t believe everything you hear.” Many rumors “are unfounded.” That’s what Barack Obama had the audacity to tell farmers on his recent tour in the Midwest after they complained about federal regulations……Federal regulations are not only disrupting business, they are entering Americans’ lives, including how we heat our homes, light our rooms, what food we buy, how we cook it, the mattresses we sleep on, the toys our children play with, etc. Regulatory costs for businesses are passed on to consumers in such items as toilets, showerheads, cars, washing machines and dryers, ovens and refrigerators, TV sets, even bicycles. No official accounting of total regulatory costs exists, the Heritage study said. Estimates vary. Unlike accounting of tax revenues, the study says “an oft-quoted estimate of $1.75 trillion annually is about twice the amount of individual income taxes collected last year…..The cost burden imposed by new regulations can be tracked, however, the Heritage analysis said, and “it is growing substantially.” Fiscal 2010 saw record increases, and they have risen in 2011. From the start of the Obama reign to mid-FY 2011, regulators have stuck the American citizenry with $38 billion in new costs, “more than any comparable period on record.”


My Take – What fascinates me is that there are about 80,000 pages of federal regulations; so what in the world could they have left out? There is only one answer to getting fewer regulations. Fewer regulators! RK



For the second time in two years, federal agents from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service have raided two Tennessee factories that make iconic Gibson guitars. The government alleges that Gibson imported woods in violation of the Lacey Act, a century-old law that makes it a federal crime to trade in plants, wildlife, or timber that have been harvested in violation of “any foreign law.”



"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes, and ships, and sealing wax -
Of cabbages and kings,
And why the sea is boiling hot,
And whether pigs have wings."

###

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

With Our Own Values They Destroy Us

By Rich Kozlovich

“In Thucydides’ History of the Peloponnesian War, an Athenian ambassador refutes the Spartans’ claim that they are going to war with Athens on the principle of justice:
Calculations of interest have made you take up the cry of justice––a consideration which no one ever yet brought forward to hinder his ambition when he had a chance of gaining anything by might.
Thucydides presents here a permanent truth of interstate conflict: when force will not get a people what they want, they will often cloak their ambitions in lofty principles like justice in order to gain sympathy, buy time, and win allies. “ - Bruce Thornton

This type of activity isn’t just between states. When people or groups have some unsavory hidden goal they appeal to the ideals of those they are attempting to destroy. By misleading them with their own values in order to attain their goals.

While still being responsible, and showing responsible care for our planet we can certainly ignore all the scare mongering by the greenies. Remember there is a difference between an environmentalist and an environmental activist. An environmentalist is defined as someone who is concerned about the environment, which is pretty much everyone. An environmental activist is concerned about power, control and money and could care less about people. Concern expressed about the  environment by these people is merely the tool used to attain those goals. And they use our own values against us to attain those goals.

The endangered species act was probably universally recognized as necessary and appropriate. Why? In my youth there was always some discussion on how the buffalo were killed by the millions for their hides and their bodies left to rot on the prairie….wasted. The passenger pigeon was also hunted to extinction. These events offended every descent person; so it was easy to see some need to prevent such wonton waste; irreverent disrespect for creation; and good stewardship. Those events offended our values at every level. Everyone felt all warm and fuzzy all over because everyone was thinking of the “romantic” species. They didn’t see where the perpetrators of the Endangered Species Act really wanted to go.

We now have different species of mice, turtles and tortoises, various species of wolf and bear, smelt (bait fish), toads, panthers, rattlesnakes, manatees, salmon, tuna, green sturgeon, lizards….and that is just a small sampling and doesn’t even begin to cover the plants that are considered endangered. And all of these various creatures require “protected” areas that cannot be logged, drilled, farmed, and mined or anything else that may disturb these species. The Border Patrol can’t even protect against illegal drug trafficking along the border in some areas because some species that is endangered lives there.

If they have their way under the auspices of the Endangered Species Act and the Clear Water Act pesticides will be “extinct” and if that is allowed to occur mankind will suffer loses to such a degree that the numbers can’t even be guessed at.

The promoters of this don’t “believe that people have the right to life” because this is a “supremacist perversion”. They believe that children are no more important that rats or pigs. They believe that “mankind is the biggest blight on the face of the earth” and that no matter how many humans died they would be against animal experimentation to find the cure to any disease. They believe that we have “no right” to be saved from “those natural diseases we are heir to”.

These greenie activists are insane and have convinced society that in name of “environmental justice” we must follow their insane course. If mankind can’t alter his environment mankind cannot survive. That is their goal!

The keys to worthwhile critical thought are the collection of information, retrieval of information and correlation of information. In other words, read it, remember it and put it together properly based on the idea that everything we are told should bear some resemblance to what we see going on in reality. We need to get this!  The green movement is constantly changing itself “into and angel of light” in order to keep everyone believing they are working to mankind’s benefit.  And we really need to get this! Nothing could be further from the truth!

To be green is to be irrational and misanthropic.

Observations From the Back Row: 8-30-11

...
“De Omnibus Dubitandum”

Video with John Stossel and Richard Tren regarding DDT
A complete list of things caused by global warming

Everything we are told should bear some resemblance to what we see going on in reality!
______________________________________
Quote of the Day

“There came a time when friends or people you work with or people you were in clubs with — you’re much younger than me so you didn’t have to go through this personally — but there came a time when racist comments would come up in the course of the conversation and in years past they were just natural. Then there came a time when people would say, ‘Hey, man why do you talk that way, I mean that is wrong. I don’t go for that so don’t talk that way around me. I just don’t believe that.’ That happened in millions of conversations and slowly the conversation was won. We have to win the conversation on climate.” Al Gore


My Take - Just when you thought the race card had been played as far as it could go!  But then this is from the High Priest of the Church of the Warming Globe and he is adamant that criticism is racist and heresy. 

I would also like to point out that I never once said that these quotes had to make any sense.  RK


Wind Power Is Dying

While the U.S. is dumping billions of dollars into wind farms and onshore and offshore wind turbines, this energy source is being cast aside as a failure elsewhere in the world.
Some 410 federations and associations from 21 European countries, for example, have united against deployment of wind farms charging it is “degrading the quality of life.”


The predictions of alarmist scientists are frequently hysterical, and most often wrong, as was globally witnessed with the Hurricane Irene forecasts. Another example of an incredibly bad "climate science" prediction was that marine life would be decimated by human-induced global warming. Scientists and empirical evidence prove that prediction wrong. A new peer-reviewed study by Chavez et al. determined that the opposite has occurred: marine life and productivity has improved during the modern warming.


When people learn more about an issue, the persuasion formula that initially worked so well for alarmists breaks down. People become less persuaded by appeals to trust the authorities, less susceptible to fear, less willing to accept emotional appeals from celebrities, less gullible. Trends in polls show that this is already happening with the global warming scare.



MEMORANDUM

TO: House Republicans
FR: Eric Cantor
DT: Monday, August 29, 2011
RE: Upcoming Jobs Agenda

As you know, we released The House Republican Plan for America’s Job Creators earlier this year. While the debt crisis has demanded much of our attention, our new majority has passed over a dozen pro-growth measures to address the equally troubling jobs crisis, such as the Energy Tax Prevention Act and the Putting the Gulf of Mexico Back to Work Act. Aside from repeal of the 1099 reporting requirement in ObamaCare, however, each House Republican jobs bill now sits dormant in the Democrat-controlled Senate. You can view the progress of our jobs bills at MajorityLeader.gov/JobsTracker……


Penn State had no issue with research by Michael Mann and, with qualifications about his 'statistical analysis techniques', the National Science Foundation cleared him as well, so why hasn't this ClimateGate thing gone away?....He seems to be bragging that UVA has stonewalled skeptics the way the University of East Anglia did, and which got them into trouble. What law says 'private discussions between scientists about science' are exempt from a Freedom of Information Act request? None....If he wants to have his emails exempt, he simply has to stop taking public money. Progressives in science who cheered Greenpeace efforts to condemn and harass skeptics using FOIA requests but cheer stonewalling now are hypocrites of the highest order.

"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes, and ships, and sealing wax -
Of cabbages and kings,
And why the sea is boiling hot,
And whether pigs have wings."

###

Monday, August 29, 2011

Observations From the Back Row: 8-29-11

...
“De Omnibus Dubitandum”

Video with John Stossel and Richard Tren regarding DDT
A complete list of things caused by global warming

Everthing we are told should bear some resemblance to what we see going on in reality!
______________________________________


Quote of the Day – Even with subsidies, wind and solar still can’t compete, unless they are also exempted from endangered species and other environmental laws. If you shoot an eagle, or birds die in an uncovered oil company waste pit, fines and possibly prison terms are meted out. But wind farms slaughter bald and golden eagles, falcons, hawks, curlews, bats and other threatened, endangered and just plain majestic sky dwellers with no consequences. They even get fast-tracked through the environmental review process by the same Interior Department and EPA that routinely delay or deny

By Alan Caruba

I recently received a news release from The Council of State Governments headlined “New Report: Renewable Energy Worth Investment for Southern States” that touted “job creation, environment and public health” as benefits. It was filled with lies.......The United States does have the capacity to become more energy independent because it is home to vast reserves of coal, oil and natural gas. The policy of the Obama administration has been to attack existing coal-fired utilities and coal producers despite the fact that it accounts for fifty percent of all electricity generated. As for oil, literally billions of barrels remain untapped and unused because successive administrations have limited or banned access to it.........“According to an analysis by Chris Horner, an energy expert at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, the stimulus bill’s subsidies for renewable energy cost taxpayers about $475,000 for every job created.”.......According to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, of roughly 300 projects delayed or killed over the last few years, 65 were for renewables. The assault on the “dirty” energy, coal, continues unabated by environmental groups such as Friends of the Earth and the Sierra Club...........Like everything else with the word “green” attached to it, renewable energy is just another massive scam like the all the lies that kept global warming going until that enormous and costly hoax was finally discredited.

Personal Note - Alan has graciously allowed me to republish his works, which I have been doing going back some years.  It has been said that Alan's work has a "timelessness to it".  I find that to be true and this article will be published as a stand alone piece in the future.  To see more of Alan's work please take a look at, "Caruba's Corner; Green Myths and Other Lies", at the right of this blog. RK


G.O.P. presidential candidates should emphasize that reining in the E.P.A. is a constitutional imperative. Yes, Americans are worried about jobs and the economy, but arguing from constitutional principle immediately puts you on the moral high ground. Which constitutional precepts are relevant here? Only the people’s representatives, not non-elected bureaucrats, should have the power to decide national policy. Legislative intent, not semantic cleverness, should determine the extent of an agency’s power. No one should be judge of his own cause……

The E.P.A.’s power grab is only the most extreme example of a larger malady: regulation without representation. Today, agencies not only develop regulatory proposals, but also enact the rules, based on analyses they themselves conduct. This is too much power to vest in officials not accountable to the public at the ballot box. G.O.P. presidential contenders should thus also support the Reins Act, which would restore the separation of powers by explicitly making Congress responsible for regulatory decisions.

Guitar Frets: Environmental Enforcement Leaves Musicians in Fear

Federal agents swooped in on Gibson Guitar Wednesday, raiding factories and offices in Memphis and Nashville, seizing several pallets of wood, electronic files and guitars. The Feds are keeping mum, but in a statement yesterday Gibson's chairman and CEO, Henry Juszkiewicz, defended his company's manufacturing policies, accusing the Justice Department of bullying the company. "The wood the government seized Wednesday is from a Forest Stewardship Council certified supplier," he said, suggesting the Feds are using the aggressive enforcement of overly broad laws to make the company cry uncle….If you are the lucky owner of a 1920s Martin guitar, it may well be made, in part, of Brazilian rosewood. Cross an international border with an instrument made of that now-restricted wood, and you better have correct and complete documentation proving the age of the instrument. Otherwise, you could lose it to a zealous customs agent—not to mention face fines and prosecution…..Recent revisions to 1900's Lacey Act require that anyone crossing the U.S. border declare every bit of flora or fauna being brought into the country. One is under "strict liability" to fill out the paperwork—and without any mistakes….. Even if you have no knowledge—despite Herculean efforts to obtain it—that some piece of your guitar, no matter how small, was obtained illegally, you lose your guitar forever," Prof. Thomas has written. "Oh, and you'll be fined $250 for that false (or missing) information in your Lacey Act Import Declaration."


Malaria-carrying mosquitoes are disappearing in some parts of Africa, but scientists are unsure as to why. Figures indicate controls such as anti-mosquito bed nets are having a significant impact on the incidence of malaria in some sub-Saharan countries. But in Malaria Journal, researchers say mosquitoes are also disappearing from areas with few controls.


The city of Warren is cracking down on those who harbor mosquitoes after the suspected death this week of a Macomb County man from the West Nile Virus. Mayor Jim Fouts said those who have stagnant pools or ponds and other areas that harbor mosquitoes could face a $1,000 fine. The mayor said Michigan was one of the top two states in both fatalities and serious illnesses caused by West Nile almost 10 years ago. Under the new plan, Fouts said said inspectors will look for pools of water in places like dumpsters, wheelbarrows, tires, pipes, drains and flower pot.



Amazing: They have just shown that lifestyle is irrelevant but still cannot help themseves from preaching the lifestyle gospel. There's a lot of religion in all the "sciences" as far as I can see. These guys are just as much men of faith as any Christian. John Ray

Parents increase their child's risk of coronary heart disease through their genes and not through the family's diet or lifestyle, a new study shows. Children born to parents with CHD are 40 to 60 per cent more likely to develop the condition themselves, but growing up in an unhealthy household is of little importance. Although children of people who suffer from the condition were already known to be at increased risk, it was not previously clear whether this was due to genetics or because children of unhealthy parents adopt similar lifestyles. But a study of more than 80,000 men and women who were adopted as children showed that susceptibility to the disease is transmitted in the womb and not in the home. Smoking, eating unhealthy food and avoiding exercise still play a major role in an individual's chance of developing CHD, doctors said, but the risk that is passed down through families is based on DNA rather than behaviour.

Stuff You Won’t See on the News

A New Understanding of Aging and Disease
based on subtle electrical phenomena in DNA and RNA



"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes, and ships, and sealing wax -
Of cabbages and kings,
And why the sea is boiling hot,

Sunday, August 28, 2011

American Council on Science and Health, 2011: Week 34

The presence of linked articles here are merely a way of showing what is going on, whether I agree or disagree with the positions presented. Rich Kozlovich

CANCER

Too much of a good thing? Pap tests over-used
A new study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has found that doctors are screening women for cervical cancer far more frequently than guidelines recommend.

Hormone replacement study’s unintended consequences: Fewer mammograms
Fewer women had mammograms done in 2005, and a recent study published in the journal Cancer suggests that the decline is linked to a decreased use of hormone replacement therapy for menopausal symptoms.

DIATETES

Docs and diabetic kids need to stick to guidelines
Eye exams and tests of long-term blood sugar control are routine methods of managing diabetes: hemoglobin A1C tests offer a picture of a diabetic person's blood sugar levels over the course of several months, while regular eye exams can spot and allow for early treatment of the damaged retinal blood vessels associated with diabetes.

DIET

If you can stick to certain diets, they may lower your cholesterol
People on the verge of having high cholesterol were able to significantly lower their low-density lipoprotein (or, "bad" cholesterol) levels after changing their diets to include such foods as nuts, oats, soy milk, tofu, and beans.

You can have your chocolate milk and drink it too
Flavored milk hasn't soured after all: This September, parents and kids will find that the chocolate- and strawberry-infused varieties will contain fewer calories and less sugar.

Vitamins reduce incidence of pre-term and underweight babies
Pregnant women of normal weight who were taking a multivitamin four weeks prior to and eight weeks after their last menstrual cycle had a 20 percent lower risk of delivering a preterm or small-for-age baby.

FOOD SAFTEY

Cooking up a foodborne illness
When it comes to following food safety guidelines, master chef Michael Ruhlman is a bit of a culinary maverick.

GMO’S

Over-regulation of genetically-modified crops will worsen food shortages"
Civilization depends on our expanding ability to produce food efficiently, which has markedly accelerated thanks to science and technology," writes biologist Nina V. Fedoroff in her recent New York Times op-ed.

HEART

Silver lining for heart attack patients
Good news for heart attack patients who wind up in the emergency room and require an artery-opening procedure called an angioplasty: nearly all of the procedures are now performed within the recommended 90 minutes from hospital arrival.

SCARES AND CONSEQUENCES

A big stink about nothing
There is an odor wafting from the University of Washington - very like the one we discussed last October - and once again, the source is Dr. Anne Steinemann's claims that commercial fragrances are hazardous to our health.

One way to reduce COPD flare-ups
There is an odor wafting from the University of Washington - very like the one we discussed last October - and once again, the source is Dr. Anne Steinemann's claims that commercial fragrances are hazardous to our health.

Another chemical witch-hunt: Triclosan
Dr. Oz is urging fans across the country to publicly dump soaps and toothpastes containing it; the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) has filed a lawsuit to hasten FDA regulation of it; Representative Edward J. Markey (D-MA) has proposed to ban it; but there remains no scientific evidence that the antibacterial chemical triclosan is harmful to humans.

STUDIES

Pediatrics publishes some suspect studies
We've previously questioned some of the studies that have been accepted for publication in the journal Pediatrics, and now Dr. Sara B. DeMauro of the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia has done the same in her study - which appears in that very journal.

TOBACCO

Working on regulating tobacco harm reduction
ACSH's Dr. Gilbert Ross and Jody Manley have just returned from an FDA workshop on modified risk tobacco products (MRTP), which was convened as directed in the 2009 law granting regulatory authority over tobacco products to the FDA.

More myth-busting: Dissolvable tobacco and scary labels
An article in the current issue of TIME magazine poses the question, "How Safe is Tobacco that Melts in Your Mouth?"

Average readings over time make for better BP control
A U.K. study just published in The Lancet suggests that ambulatory blood pressure monitoring could soon become standard practice for patients thought to have high blood pressure.

THIS AND THAT

Hurricanes — and quakes
As Hurricane Irene approaches the Eastern Seaboard, a little commonsense advice:

VACCINES

Another benefit of the HPV vaccine
Cervarix, one of the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccines used in innoculations against cervical cancer in girls, also appears to protect against the HPV infection responsible for most anal cancers.

Shooting for higher flu vaccination rates
Vaccine for the 2011-12 flu season is now available, and health experts recommend that all of us get immunized for the fall and winter months that lie ahead.

It was a mostly good week for vaccines
Once again, the alleged link between autism and vaccines has been thoroughly and publicly denounced by an esteemed panel of scientists, this time from the Institute of Medicine (IOM).

If there is a health scare today, the American Council on Science and Health will most likely have the answer by tomorrow; and for members it will appear in your e-mail. No effort on your part, except to read the answer. All that the ACSH is interested in are the facts and they are prepared to follow them wherever they lead. Who can ask for more?  Please Donate Now!

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Saturday, August 27, 2011

Spreading 'Big Oil' Subsidy Disinformation

By Paul Driessen

This first appeared here.

Every American manufacturing company gets tax deductions that help it create jobs and strengthen our economy – whether it produces newspapers, furniture, cars or fuel. Eliminating those deductions would increase unemployment and further slow our nation’s desperately needed economic recovery.

Yet that is precisely what President Obama wants to do when oil companies want to use the deductions. It is one of many ways the Obama administration is undermining the oil industry and 9.2 million Americans whose jobs it supports. It is part of the administration’s strategy for replacing fossil fuels with heavily subsidized “alternatives” that taxpayers cannot afford, and consumers will not purchase on their own.
Newspapers that benefit from the same genre of tax deductions as oil companies nevertheless sometimes join attacking the oil industry, and the jobs and benefits it creates. This is rank hypocrisy.

“If Republicans are truly determined to slash the budget and end government waste,” the New York Times editorialized, “they will start [by] ending the web of tax breaks enjoyed by the rolling-in-dough oil industry and terminating the ethanol subsidy. Together these cuts would save up to $100 billion over 10 years.”

The Times is right about ending ethanol subsidies. But it and other “progressives” are wrong on every other argument they present to justify their job-killing, economy-crippling energy agenda.
1.)  Oil industry tax deductions cover costs incurred in exploration, drilling, production, transportation and refining. They aren’t subsidies or special tax breaks. They are essentially the same deductions claimed by all manufacturers, in conducting their business under our complex tax code. They ensure that businesses recover their costs and get taxed only on net income, in the process of making essential products.

Refineries and petrochemical manufacturers play an especially vital role in the oil industry – transforming crude oil and natural gas into fuels and raw materials used to make fabrics, plastics, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, fertilizers, carpets, paints, roofing, siding, and myriad other products that improve and safeguard our lives. Solar panels and resins for fiberglass wind turbine blades are also petroleum-based.

The NY Times itself enjoys similar tax breaks, and hasn’t offered to give one of them up, to help end government waste. Nor have other newspapers, some of which have even sought to benefit under the “failing newspaper act,” which would let them operate as “educational nonprofits,” and pay no taxes. Others have sought exemptions from antitrust laws, so that they can set online subscription prices.

In truth, in this internet and online media age, we could live without newspapers. But as an American Express advertising executive might say, Oil: You can't leave home without it. Nor can you have modern civilization or improved health and living standards without it.

2.)  Most petroleum companies aren’t “Big Oil.” They’re small independents. And the entire industry operates under government policies and regulations that keep many of America’s best oil and gas prospects off limits and make leasing, exploration and drilling needlessly expensive and time-consuming. Between 1981 and 2008, the largest consolidated oil companies (“Big Oil”) alone paid $1.95 trillion in severance, property, excise, sales and corporate income taxes, the Tax Foundation reports.

Eliminate the tax deductions amid the current regulatory and political climate, and fewer wells will be drilled, fewer deposits will be profitable enough to develop, fields will be abandoned prematurely, royalty revenues will decline, refineries will close or move overseas, workers will lose their jobs, their income tax payments will morph into welfare checks, and we will import still more oil and refined products.

3.)  A primary reason oil and gasoline prices are so high, unemployment is stuck at 9% and our economic growth is anemic is that government has made most of our western states, Alaskan and Outer Continental Shelf energy prospects off limits. It raises unfounded concerns about hydraulic fracturing, and drags its feet on permits for lands that supposedly are “available” for leasing and drilling. In short, it chokes off supplies. Meanwhile, politicians stoke demand – with legislation like the NAT GAS Act. That bill would obligate US taxpayers to pony up some $14 billion annually in subsidies (aka, tax credits and rebates), to encourage motorists to buy natural gas-fueled cars and trucks, and service stations to install natural gas fueling stations.

Eliminate oil company tax deductions: “save” $4 billion. Subsidize car and truck purchases: spend $14 billion. It’s unsustainable. It’s insane.

4.)  Real subsidies take money taken from society’s productive sectors, and transfer it to legislators and bureaucrats, who give it to companies that “deserve” funding, because they provide politically favored products or could not remain in business without perpetual infusions of Other People’s Money. You support our reelection, our “catastrophic manmade global warming” thesis and our commitment to a renewable energy future, and you’ll continue receiving taxpayer cash – until the OPM runs out.

Evergreen Solar received $486 million in federal and state subsidies – but still closed its doors and fired 850 workers, when the subsidy well ran dry. The same thing happened to five of six solar companies in Germany. The jobs went to China and Malaysia, which have lower costs and fewer regulations.

5.)  Even with subsidies, wind and solar still can’t compete, unless they are also exempted from endangered species and other environmental laws. If you shoot an eagle, or birds die in an uncovered oil company waste pit, fines and possibly prison terms are meted out. But wind farms slaughter bald and golden eagles, falcons, hawks, curlews, bats and other threatened, endangered and just plain majestic sky dwellers with no consequences. They even get fast-tracked through the environmental review process by the same Interior Department and EPA that routinely delay or deny oil and gas applications.

6.)  Then there’s ethanol. Producing 13.2 billion gallons of it in 2010 required one-quarter of all the corn grown in the United States – monopolizing 23 million acres (Grade A cropland the size of Indiana) and consuming 1.2 trillion gallons of water, along with prodigious amounts of petroleum in the form of fertilizer and tractor, truck and distillery fuel. While corn growers get rich, higher corn prices mean pork and chicken producers pay more for feed, meat producers are driven out of business, manufacturers pay more for corn syrup, consumers pay more for food, and more jobs disappear.

America could produce far more gasoline from a mere 2,000 acres in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (1/20 of Washington, DC), if anti-oil zealots would end their opposition to drilling in the frozen tundra.

And still ethanol enjoys fuel pump mandates, $6 billion in annual subsidies, and tariffs against foreign competition – so that consumers can “choose” a fuel that gets a third fewer miles per gallon than gasoline.

Meanwhile, the Defense Department is doing a theirs-not-to-reason-why Light Brigade charge into the jaws of biofuel R&D – and extolling the virtues of camellia-based jet fuel that costs $67 a gallon, versus $5 per gallon for aviation gas that could also come from ANWR, the OCS and other off-limits US lands.
The bottom line is simple. The worst thing we can do is what President Obama is intent on doing: use the mythical revenues he expects from eliminating oil company “subsidies and tax breaks” to increase federal wind, solar and ethanol subsidies by another 50% (to $18 billion a year) – so as to “foster the clean energy economy of the future and reduce our reliance on fossil fuels that contribute to climate change.”

As should be abundantly clear by now, these energy sources are not so clean or eco-friendly. They can’t exist without perpetual subsidies. They are simply not sustainable. To provide reliable, affordable, ecological, sustainable energy … put people back to work … rejuvenate our economy … and generate trillions in new government revenue – we need to do three things.

Open America’s public lands for responsible hydrocarbon development. Take the boot off the neck of American businesses. And get rid of all the subsidies, bailouts, targeted tax breaks, selective tariffs, mandates to purchase ethanol and other products, and other corporate welfare gimmicks that make tax lawyers and lobbyists more important than researchers, trained workers and top-flight CEOs.

"Paul Driessen is senior policy adviser for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT), which is sponsoring the All Pain No Gain petition against global-warming hype. He also is a senior policy adviser to the Congress of Racial Equality and author of Eco-Imperialism: Green Power - Black Death."


Friday, August 26, 2011

Observations From the Back Row: 8-26-11

...
Everthing we are told should bear some resemblance to what we see going on in reality!
“De Omnibus Dubitandum”

Quote of the Day - The endless absurdity oozing out of the climate change cesspool would be hilarious if it weren’t so costly. - Paul Driessen

Word of the Day - Coprolite - Fossilized excrement. coprolitic cop'ro·lit'ic (-lÄ­t'Ä­k) adj.

Animal Rights and the Globalist Agenda

While everyone knows that Animal Rights (A/R) is at the far left extreme of the political spectrum, most people do not understand what A/R is or where they fit into the New Age/Globalism scheme. A/R, like the Green movement, is a multimillion dollar business that is a cabal for taking people out of the natural structure of the earth. And while most people sense that A/R is extreme, they have no idea of what the A/R movement’s core beliefs are. People confuse animal rights with animal welfare which are as different as black and white.

Animal Rights is not Animal Welfare

Here’s another issue that is decided with the mentality of a little girl who just likes fluffy animals. The Animal Rights movement is one of the most violent of the nation. It plays on the heartstrings of emotional children, like actress Pam Anderson, where reason and knowledge give way to raw emotion. Most people take up the animal rights cause because they care about the “welfare” of the animals. Few want to see animals suffer and they want something done when it happens. But animal welfare and animal protection have nothing to do with the animal rights movement. Frankly, it’s too nuts to explain rationally. So, here, let them tell you in their own words. TD

Stuff You Won’t See on the News





"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes, and ships, and sealing wax -
Of cabbages and kings,
And why the sea is boiling hot,
And whether pigs have wings."

###




Thursday, August 25, 2011

An Avalanche of Nonsense

By Alan Caruba

This first appeared here in 2007. As always I wish to thank Alan for allowing me to republish his works. You may wish to peruse the section on the right entitled, Caruba's Corner: Green Lies and Other Myths, for more of his work. Republishing this article seemed more than appropriate considering Paul Driessen's latest article (which I posted yesterday) showing the nonsense that has been part and parcel of the Global Warming scare from the beginning. I also thought that this would be a good way to show that there has been a number of people who have recognized that this was a gigantic conspiratorial hoax on the world's people from the beginning and stated their positions clearly and intelligently, only to be vilified by the quasi-pagan acolytes of the green movement. RK

I have to remind myself that I may well be in the minority whenever I protest the lies and nonsense that assail me daily regarding “global warming” or just about anything that issues forth, flatulently, from the United Nations.

An Agence France Press story on Monday is a splendid example. Some moronic scribe labored to produce “Global warming may soon see Santa don shorts.” It began with the assertion that Europe’s far north was “already feeling the effects of global warming” and proceeded from there with the usual assurance that “global warming” is actually happening.

This is such a commonplace journalistic device and deception as to drive better-informed people crazy. However, on Breitbart.com where I found the story, more than thirty seriously annoyed people weighed in with their comments and all of them derided the fatuous piece of idiocy. In fact, some of Europe’s glaciers have been growing and a quick check of recent winters will reveal the continent has had some major cold spells.

Similarly, the International Herald Tribune, owned I believe by The New York Times, spewed forth a story, “Global food supply is dwindling rapidly, UN agency warns.” Having just gone through two weeks of stories out of Bali, filled with dire predictions that we’re all just toast, thanks to the latest vacation-cum-conference on global warming, it totally escapes me why anyone believes anything this bloated, corrupt, and ineffectual international excuse for bad information, bad ideas, and bad performance has to say on any subject.

A teacher of mine long ago said that, “No nation is more than two weeks away from a revolution if it runs out of food.” There’s some truth to that. The French Revolution that devolved into a bloodbath began when the price of bread and other staples rose to a point that it emboldened the peasants to go looking for the king and his family with a view to beheading them. The reason for the problem was that Europe (and North America) was in the grip of a mini-ice age that had begun around 1300 and would not abate until around 1850.

But! The UN says we are in the midst of a “global warming” and from this one might conclude that the growing season for crops is longer and therefore more productive. Silly you. Applying any kind of logic to “global warming” is a fool’s game.

The price of basic food crops is going up. Why? Because geniuses like those in our Congress keep mandating that useless fuel additives such as ethanol drain off vast quantities of corn for its production. Elsewhere in the effort to insure crop failure, everything that could be done to thwart the introduction of genetically modified crops—crops that are resistant to drought or various forms of predation—has been one of the environmental movement’s rallying cries for a very long time.

It’s all part of the avalanche of nonsense the citizens of the world must suffer thanks to those who, in their hearts, would prefer to return the earth to penguins, polar bears, pandas, and weeds.

Alan’s work has a sense of timelessness about it, so anyone perusing these articles in the future will find them equally insightful as they were when originally written. For Alan's latest thoughts go to his blog, Warning Signs. For his past works go to The National Anxiety Center. I would also recommend reading his last book, Right Answers.

Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Climate prostitutes, charlatans and comedians

by Paul Driessen

As always, I wish to thank Paul for allowing me to publish his work. RK

Their “research” would be hilarious if it didn’t cost taxpayers and consumers so dearly - Put these guys on Comedy Central. Put ‘em in an asylum ... a mandatory restitution program ... jail perhaps ... or a witness protection program, if they turn state’s evidence on other perpetrators. But keep them away from our money – and our energy, economic, healthcare and education policies.

Climate prostitutes, parasites and charlatans have been devouring billions in US taxpayer dollars, year after year, plus billions more in corporate shareholder cash, activist foundation funds and state government grants. The laws, mandates, subsidies and regulations they advance have cost taxpayers and consumers still more billions for “alternative” energy and other schemes that send prices skyrocketing, kill jobs, and reduce health and living standards.

It’s time to end this destructive saga and, while we’re at it, pink-slip the politicians and bureaucrats who pour billions of hard-earned tax dollars into perpetual climate “research,” “education” and “environmental” programs. They’re actively complicit or have completely failed to perform proper due diligence.

Global cooling has morphed into global warming, climate change, global climate disruption, climate “weirding” and extreme weather events – always manmade, always imminently catastrophic, always requiring eternal research and wrenching societal transformation, to “save the planet.”

The endless absurdity oozing out of the climate change cesspool would be hilarious if it weren’t so costly.

“Global warming: Is weight loss a solution?” the “peer-reviewed” International Journal of Obesity breathlessly wondered a few weeks ago. Most definitely. Fat people breathe more and thus emit more carbon dioxide. If the world’s 1.5 billion obese and overweight adults all lost 22 pounds apiece and kept if off for a year, the reduction in CO2 would equal 0.2% of global emissions from burning fossil fuels and manufacturing cement. (Translation: “health professionals” deserve more climate research loot.)

If you need more proof that “obesity and climate change are linked,” simply consider how awful life is now in Mexico, the same authors argued in an article for their Climate and Health Council. One in four Mexicans is now obese. “The planet is getting hotter, its people are getting fatter, and the use of fossil fuel energy is the cause of both. Large increases in motor vehicle traffic have decimated levels of physical activity. This, combined with increased availability of energy-dense food, has propelled the body mass index in the entire [Mexican] population upward.”

“Moving to a low-carbon economy could be the next great public health advance,” the CHC “experts” suggested. But even eating less meat won’t be enough, nor reducing dependence on dairy products, nor even vegetarianism, pal reviewers intoned. “We have to be vegans,” get rid of cars – and reduce human populations, perhaps with “China’s one-child policy (entailing elements of compulsion)” as the model.

Didn’t we try that low-carb, low-carbon stuff for most of human history? Aren’t they still trying it in Sub-Saharan Africa? Do we want dictatorial one-child policies in an era of “choice” and aging pensioners?

Some aren’t sure this meatless diet craze is crazy. They claim the link between climate change and raising animals for meat is borne out by Earth history. According to a Texas paleontologist, dung and flatulence from herds of hadrosaurs, the Cretaceous equivalent to modern cattle, could have contributed to Arctic warming 70 million years ago. Other scientists say the hypothesis is a load of coprolite.

Nearly 2,000 animal species “are fleeing global warming by heading north much faster than they were less than a decade ago,” asserts new “research” just published in the once-credible journal Science. The opportunistic species are moving at the breakneck speed of “about a mile a year,” intrepid climate-chaos promoter Seth Borenstein anxiously noted in his AP wire story.

The situation could quickly reverse if reduced solar activity and the past two years’ frigid Northern Hemisphere winters become the new norm. But neither Science nor the AP mentioned that or explained how the current migrations differ from what’s been happening since the last Pleistocene glaciers retreated and the Little Ice Age ended.

Instead, we’ve been repeatedly treated to amusingly convoluted back-peddling from earlier pronouncements that ski resorts will be a thing of the past and “children just aren’t going to remember what snow is.” Now we’re told that global warming can worsen winters and increase snowfalls. In fact, as one Greenpeace activist explained, “Global warming can mean colder. It can mean wetter. It can mean drier. That’s what we’re talking about.”

Actually, what we’re talking about is Earth’s constantly changing weather and climate caused – not by hydrocarbon use – but by complex, chaotic, unpredictable atmospheric, oceanic, solar, planetary and other forces whose interactions and effects scientists are only beginning to understand. To respond adequately to them, we need building, heating, air conditioning and other technology to adapt to, cope with, and protect our lives and property against those forces – and the prosperity to afford that technology.

Unfortunately, policies, laws and regulations driven by climate “research” and horror stories are making it increasingly difficult to address those needs. Rather than developing our nation’s own vast natural resource and human resources, America is wasting billions on politically correct technologies and companies, like Evergreen Solar, which got $486 million in taxpayer subsidies before going belly-up this month. As Al Gore likes to say, that is unsustainable.

Meanwhile, a steady stream of headline-grabbing “studies” continues to power the climate scare and renewable energy gravy train. Retired professor John Brignell’s website presents hundreds of absurd research claims, from the Alps melting and Amazon being destroyed, to “Italy robbed of pasta,” to the “world going up in flames” over resource scarcity and zebra mussels taking over the Thames River – all because of global warming. The website is not up-to-date, but here’s one recent gem he could add.

A new taxpayer-funded NASA/Penn State “scientific” study warns that “ecosystem-valuing universalist” (really “green”) aliens might realize that we have been altering “the chemical composition of Earth’s atmosphere,” conclude that we have “ecological destructive tendencies,” and “wipe humanity out in order to preserve the Earth system as a whole.” (And you thought James Hansen and Michael Mann were the only loons collecting big bucks at these institutions of “vital research” and “higher education.”)

This interminable pessimism undoubtedly prompted climate activist Danny Bloom to marry his longtime companion and love of his life: Mother Earth – in a charming ceremony officiated by an online justice of the peace. Perhaps he can consummate his marriage, using one of “the first-ever eco-friendly luxury condoms,” which were developed by two French aristocrats and introduced in the USA just in time for Valentine’s Day 2011. Unlike other condom manufacturers, the Original Condom Company is “extremely eco aware and makes every effort to cover their carbon footprint.”

These attention-getting stunts may not save the planet. But responsible citizens may be able to save the republic, by helping Congress, the White House and their “debt committee” to find a few places where tens of billions are being wasted on excess bureaucrats, bogus research, useless reports and destructive policies.

President Reagan once observed that, if politics is the second oldest profession, it bears a striking resemblance to the first. A corollary might be that, even if the perpetrators are wearing eco-friendly luxury condoms, most citizens don’t like getting screwed by elected officials and unelected bureaucrats.

With Congress home for more fact-finding meetings with constituents, citizens have a perfect opportunity to send a powerful message. Let’s make the most of it.


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Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Observations From the Back Row: 8-23-11

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“De Omnibus Dubitandum”

Video with John Stossel and Richard Tren regarding DDT

Everthing we are told should bear some resemblance to what we see going on in reality!

You absolutely gotta read this article

Teachers, Preachers and Greens… The Unholy Alliance to Transform America

When Communism “fell” in the late 1980’s, those who were busy scheming to impose global governance on the sovereign nations had a problem. Suddenly, the only super power in the world was the United States – the only nation on Earth based on the ideals of limited government, individual liberty and free enterprise. If American bedrock ideals of freedom took hold in the emerging nations of the old Soviet Empire, global governance was impossible.....School reform = Indoctrination....Green Invasion of Christian Churches.......
.......The Boulder audience was told that right now, Mother Earth is bringing Pan back to save us and lead us into the New Age. The audience was told it could help by surrendering to Pan, tuning into the crystal matrix frequencies and carrying out the directions while tuned in. Arguelles then explained this might included the physical removal of Christians because they are the biggest obstacle to transformation.  Can Americans have any doubt as to where the Earth worshipping, radical environmental movement intends to take American society? Why are “Christian” leaders and officials locking arms with such foes of the American ideal of freedom, and to help them destroy the very religion they profess to lead?  America is in a life or death battle for its very soul,


The African Biofortified Sorghum project centered in South Africa, is striving to breed sorghum with extra lysine, vitamin A, iron, and zinc to help millions of African small farmers meet their families’ nutritional needs. The project is funded by the Bill Gates Foundation, collaborating with Du Pont and Pioneer Hi-Bred Seeds. Unfortunately, the project has been unable to get South African regulatory approval for its field trials. The test planting will now have to be done in the U.S., though African trials would be a better test…….. The ultimate First World political roadblock: Africa spends virtually no money on developing new high-yield seeds—but thanks to Europe it already has a complete set of environmental regulatory hurdles ready to block biotech crops on the grounds of unproven risks to “food and environmental safety.” The regulators seem to ignore the obvious potential benefits such as food security and wildlands preservation. The Green Movement long ago convinced the First World of a huge global warming threat, which has failed to occur. Similarly, they have convinced Africa’s educated elite that biotech seeds are a bigger threat to Africa’s people and wild species than famine.

Let’s look at the concerns Africans raise about biotech:


In its current issue, The New Yorker has an excellent piece on the prevalence of (unconscious) bias in scientific studies that builds on this recent must-read piece in The Atlantic. And to some extent, Jonah Lehrer’s New Yorker article builds on this story he did for Wired in 2009. Anyone interested in the scientific process should read all three, for they are provocative cautionary tales.

 
Prices at gas pumps are at some of the highest levels ever and rising. Americans want answers. In particular they want the names and numbers of those to blame. To answer that question perhaps they should simply consult the phone book or look in the mirror. Because the main culprits in the rising gas prices aren’t necessarily members of OPEC, but the American people who support policies that block new drilling and the building of new refineries on American soil. It’s that simple.  The real political parties in America are the NIMBYs (Not In My Back Yard) and the BANANAs (Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anything). These two political forces are driving the future of the nation by dictating the policy agendas of the Republicans and Democrats. Soon, the national bird will no longer be the noble eagle, but the ostrich.......
 
....Rules and regulations, both federal and state, are blocking the industry’s ability to build new refineries.  Even worse: old, worn out refineries are closing, reducing capacity even more. In California, ten refineries representing 20% of the state’s refining capacity were closed between 1985 and 1995. With California energy policy literally dominated by radical environmental groups, it is unlikely that any new refineries will ever be built.

To build a new refinery would take a risk of at least $2 billion in a ten-year undertaking. In the end, even if permits are obtained there is no guarantee that the refinery will ever be built. Nobody wants to invest in new refineries because there is no money to be made. If there were investors willing to take the risk, where would it be built? What town would welcome it? What land would be used? Radical environmentalists are well organized to build pressure on any politician who might support such an endeavor. They know how to energize the NIMBYs and BANANAs. All the greens have to do is voice concerns about air pollution or the dangers of large trucks carrying hazardous materials or the potential for leakage into the environment. Just a hint at these things and poof, the refinery is history. Scientific facts are rarely heard in the din of the argument.



Stuff You Won't See On The News



"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes, and ships, and sealing wax -
Of cabbages and kings,
And why the sea is boiling hot,
And whether pigs have wings."

###

Monday, August 22, 2011

Observations From the Back Row: 8-22-11

...
In order to make this video the complete focus of everyone's attention this will be the only link in today's post. RK

Video with John Stossel and Richard Tren regarding DDT


"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes, and ships, and sealing wax -
Of cabbages and kings,
And why the sea is boiling hot,
And whether pigs have wings."

###

Sunday, August 21, 2011

Stuff You Won't See on the News!



For all the news junkies and those who are interested in the issues with Islam, the western world and the decline of the west, please follow the series with Charles Hill and Faoud Ajami.   This is followed by a video series regarding the Soviet Union, communism and the west.  I hardily recommend these two video series because you not only will you not see this on the news....I guarantee that you will never see this on the History or Discovery Channels.  RK


In London and other English cities, young black savages have been wreaking such havoc that even Prime Minister David Cameron, who is generally as genteel as Queen Victoria, has referred to them as “scum.”  It figured that once England’s riffraff showed the world what they were made of, America’s own would step up to the challenge. The fact is, if there were an Olympics where young louts could compete for medals in such events as car-burning, looting and beating up innocent people, our own black thugs would consistently bring home the gold.


All right, I’ll come clean. I have to admit it. I am a Lutheran. And that, at least according to Joshua Green at The Atlantic, would seem to be pretty fringey stuff. Definitely outside the realm of respectable opinion in today’s world. (Which must be a surprise to all those Garrison Keillor fans.) Or… maybe I’m not a Lutheran at all, really. If you were to speak to an official of the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod, to one of whose congregations presidential hopeful Michele Bachmann used to belong, they’d probably tell you that my own church, a member of a conservative but pietistic fellowship, isn’t really Lutheran in the proper meaning of the term. We’re insufficiently sacramental in our focus, and so not truly Lutheran. And you know what? I’m OK with that.


Can we really rein in the long term growth of federal power, spending, taxation and debt? Is it enough to rely on politicians in Washington to limit their own power? In how many of the next 50 years will there be a conservative majority in Washington? How likely is it that conservative majorities will be cyclical not permanent? Do we need new constitutional limits on federal power in addition to working for conservative majorities in Washington? Is 2/3 of Congress likely to propose any constitutional limit on its own? Is state-initiated constitutional reform effort an important option for enacting new limits on federal government power? Would Congress be more likely to propose an Amendment that limits its power, when the alternative is being forced by states to call an Article V Convention? Is there significant concern, whether justified or not, about the possibility that an Article V convention of states could become a runaway convention? Does Article V, correctly interpreted, gives states the power to limit the scope of a convention they call?


I get into a lot arguments with conservatives over very non-conservative causes they believe in. For some reason there are just some conservatives who do not have a problem with certain unconstitutional acts. And just like liberals do, they all sorts of ways to justify their support for said heinous things. You know, like how Ron Paul finds ways to justify requesting earmarks for his district while simultaneously claiming to be against earmarks……..Farm subsidies go mostly to only certain crops and activities and mostly to a very select few “farmers” which tend to be huge corporate entities. Not that there is anything wrong with corporate farms mind you. Although some people have an irrational fear of them. Now, these farm subsidies include, from highest to lowest in 2010: corn, wheat, soybeans, cotton, rice, sorghum, livestock, tobacco (something government claims to hate and get rid of), peanuts, barley, the dairy industry, sunflowers, canola, oat, wool, flax and “trees”[1]. There are also huge payments made to programs for disaster relief and conservation as well as wetlands preservation.


Liberals like to think the laws of economics are like the laws of physics. In physics, particles behave differently on the subatomic level than they do in the macroscopic realm. This is because as one gets smaller and smaller, different forces become dominant and take control of how particles interact with one another thus leading to sometimes counterintuitive solutions. This is why there is an entire field of physics, called quantum mechanics, to deal with this special situation. Economics however, does not act differently on the macro or micro level. Yes, there are actually two fields of economics; microeconomics and macroeconomics. And economists, for God only knows what reason, actually try to forcibly separate the two. I think this is why liberals get confused.

American Council on Science and Health, 2011: Week 33


The presence of linked articles here are merely a way of showing what is going on, whether I agree or disagree with the positions presented. Rich Kozlovich

AUTISM

Strong evidence that autism is genetic
It has long been clear that autism runs in families; for some time, scientists have estimated that the likelihood of having a second child with autism is between 3 and 10 percent for families who already have one child with the disorder. Now, a new study appearing in the journal Pediatrics has found that risk to be significantly higher.

CANCER

Severity of prostate cancer side effects may exceed expectations
It seems that among men who undergo prostate removal, there is a disconnect between expectations and the reality of how severe the side effects of the surgery are.

Screening for lung cancer with CT scans is no scam
Findings of a study sponsored by the National Cancer Institute last year showed that screening current and former smokers with spiral CT scans can reduce lung cancer deaths by 20 percent, compared to standard chest X-rays.

Add bladder cancer to litany of smoking-related diseases
Most people are aware that smoking is associated with various cancers, including cancer of the lung and mouth, yet many may be surprised to learn that the risk of bladder cancer in current smokers is more than three times greater than it is for non-smokers.

Hot chemotherapy may not withstand the scientific heat
It seems that the latest trend in treating cancer is a combination of cytoreductive surgery and hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (Hipec) - or, as it is more familiarly called, "hot chemotherapy."

HEART

A new way to predict risk of heart attacks and stroke
Doctors typically prescribe statin medications to treat patients with high cholesterol; however, those with normal cholesterol levels may still be at risk of heart attack and stroke if they have elevated levels of coronary artery calcium (CAC).

PHARMACUETICALS

Scarce drugs boom on the gray market
Drug shortages, as ACSH's Dr. Josh Bloom explained in a recent op-ed, are a serious and growing problem in the U.S.

Help on the way? A generic drug deal
Two distinct efforts to combat increasing U.S. drug shortages are in the works

If you live by generics, you may die by them
"People are dying because of critical shortages of hundreds of essential, commonly used drugs - the kind we take for granted," writes ACSH's Dr. Josh Bloom in his op-ed that appears in today's New York Post.

SCARES AND CONSEQUENCES

Just do(n’t) do it: Nike should ignore policy recommendations from Greenpeace
Marked by its iconic swoosh, sportswear giant Nike announced plans to eliminate the release of allegedly hazardous chemicals from the production cycle of all products in its global supply chain by 2020.

STUDIES

The problem with outsourcing clinical trials
And, from the Annals of What's Wrong with Outsourcing, a new study suggests that clinical trials conducted outside the U.S. may not be a reliable indication of a drug's efficacy for its intended American population.

Don’t fear HRT: Alternative treatments don’t work
Last week we reported on findings from a study that showed soy had no beneficial effects on reducing menopausal symptoms.

Clinical trials may lose some red tape
Federally funded clinical trials may soon become less bureaucratically bound and more efficient if changes announced by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) come to pass.

THIS AND THAT

Prevent slippin’ and a slidin’ while in the bathroom
Splish splash, be careful when you take that bath!

For childbirth, patience is a virtue and health benefit
After first learning of the adverse health outcomes associated with early elective Cesarean sections, we were pleased to hear that some OBGYNS put their foot down on such procedures.

TOBACCO

E-cig testimonials
A story in yesterday's New York Post turns attention to the increasingly popular electronic cigarette.

Smokeless tobacco on the table in test cities
The FDA regulates tobacco products, but it's still determining how to categorize what are known as dissolvable tobacco products.

No money, more problems for state anti-smoking programs
States across the country are experiencing a marked decrease in their anti-smoking program budgets.

If there is a health scare today, the American Council on Science and Health will most likely have the answer by tomorrow; and for members it will appear in your e-mail. No effort on your part, except to read the answer. All that the ACSH is interested in are the facts and they are prepared to follow them wherever they lead. Who can ask for more?  Please Donate Now!

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Observations From the Back Row: 8-21-11

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“De Omnibus Dubitandum”
Everthing we are told should bear some resemblance to what we see going on in reality!
_________________________________________________________
Quote of the Day

I am the world's formost expert on IPM in structural pest control. Why? Because there is no such thing as IPM in structural pest control. IPM is an agricultural concept based on threshold limits, and therefore threshold limits is the logical foundation for IPM in agriculture.

Since clearly threshold limits can't be the logical foundation in structural pest control, then we must ask; what is the logical foundation for IPM in structural pest control?   There is none. If there is no logical foundation it doesn't exist. - Rich Kozlovich
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Corporate Social Responsibility
Why Private Industry Keeps Telling Us to “Go Green”

I’ve sounded the alarm over the dangers of Sustainable Development and the agenda for top-down control through what proponents call the “Three Es,” which includes the Environment, the Economy, and Social Equity. A fourth rail to imposing Agenda 21 is called Corporate Social Responsibility. It is the direct result of the merging of the Three Es. CSR is the map to understanding why corporations are actively promoting the “green” agenda – even to the detriment of their own business.
Picture, if you will, an Isosceles triangle. And label each point: 1.Government Power 2. Corporate Money 3. NGOs Agenda
The truth is, corporations aren’t always willing players in the partnerships – neither is government, for that matter. Many times both are answering to pressure from activists with a specific agenda. Those activists come in the form of Non-governmental organizations (NGOs). They are determined, dedicated and radical. They mean business and they have the means to force their will on companies. It’s almost masochistic to watch how they treat companies…..But something much more sinister has control over the force of corporate social responsibility. As Niger Innis, president of the Congress on Racial Equality, points out, the ideological environmental movement is a powerful $4 billion-a-year U.S. industry. On the international level it’s an $8 billion-a-year gorilla…………

Social Responsibility. It isn’t responsible at all. And it’s not very corporate. It’s enforcement of a political agenda. Many times these issues begin with what appears to be completely absurd press releases by obscure fringe groups. But businesses must not ignore the source of their rants. Once they begin to give sanction to small demands in an attempt to put on a good face – the bar will be continually raised until the business becomes merely a tool for a political agenda that is in direct opposition to their ability to stay in business as the mantra of “Go Green” results in higher prices, sacrifice and fewer choices for consumers.

My Take - For many years I have been saying that Integrated Pest Management (IPM) was nothing more than a Trojan Horse to the pest control industry. Now we have Green Pest Management (GPM) which is even more insane than IPM. What happened? The bar was raised.

Now we hear the terms, Deep Integrated Pest Management or Real Integrated Pest Management, and other nonsensical terms like Organic Pest Control, that are nothing more than a back door attempts to eliminate pesticides by insane NGO's. This article outlines how the green movement is an 8 billion dollar a year gorilla in the room. I don't know how big it really is, but a number of years ago I read that worldwide they have a yearly financial standing greater than sixty of the world's nations, and that they were so big that no trade association could possibly stand against them financially. I believe that. I also believe that the internet can change that.

What I find hard to believe is that trade associations still refuse to attack them at every level by educating the public with the facts and the consequences of the green movement. This is a war with battles being conducted at two levels. The first battle is a battle of facts. We win that, and we always have. The second battle is the battle of emotion. They win that, and they always have. In order to win we must win the battle of facts and the battle of emotion because emotion will win out over facts every time.

We need to make it clear that dystopia follows the green movement like the plague follows rats. That wins the battle of facts and the battle of emotion. When we start to do this the war will be won. It will never be over entirely because they are like barbarians hiding in the woods waiting to spring out and attack at every opportunity. But civilization exists because we recognize that we must man the wall against the barbarians.  We only fail when we refuse to remember that in a war between barbarians and wimps the barbarians will win every time. However, the biggest concern of them all are the fifth columnists within the pest control industry. For from within the walls they undermine all that needs to be done in order to defend the walls against the barbarian hordes. 



I ran this in 2009 but it has been hit a lot lately and I think it is worth running once again.  RK

In 1989 the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH) released a documentary called, Big Fears, Little Risks. This was very well received by the pesticide application, distribution and manufacturing industries. Back in those days I always “knew” where our industry stood. We “knew” that what we did was saving lives and protecting property with pesticides. Overall, people in agricultural “knew” that they were saving lives by feeding the world by growing and protecting their crops with herbicides, insecticides, fungicides and chemical fertilizers. We “knew” that the activists were wrong and needed to be stood up to and needed to be challenged. Somehow that has all changed. It was subtle and insidious, but greenies now infest our industries, and many times in positions of responsibility.......To go to the download page, click here and click the title - Big Fears, Little Risks and then follow the directions.


One rarely hears of it. Few elected officials raise an eyebrow. The media makes no mention of it. But power is slowly slipping away from our elected representatives. In much the same way Mao Tse-tung had his Red Guards, so the UN has its NGOs They may well be your masters of tomorrow, and you don’t even know who or what they are.   There are, in fact, two parallel, complimentary forces operating in the world, working together to advance the global Sustainable Development agenda, ultimately heading toward UN global governance. Those two forces are the UN itself and non-governmental organizations (NGOs.)......Should a community or state refuse to participate “voluntarily,” local chapters of the NGOs are trained to go into action. They begin to pressure city councils or county commissioners to accept the grants and implement the policy. Should they meet resistance, they begin to issue news releases telling the community their elected officials are losing millions of dollars for the community. The pressure continues until the grant is finally taken and the policy becomes local law. Americans must begin to understand that the debate over environmental issues have very little to do with clean water and air and much more to do with the establishment of power. NGOs are gaining it, locally elected officials are losing it, as the structure of American government changes to accommodate the private agendas of NGOs.




 The U.S. Department of Agriculture is paying $112 million in tax money to farmers and ranchers in 11 Western states to restore the habitat of the Sage Grouse, a bird that has not been listed as either threatened or endangered under the federal Endangered Species law because the government says there are too many of them.  Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced last week that the USDA would dedicate $21.8 million to pay eligible ranchers and farmers in the state of Wyoming to encourage conservation practices that preserve the numbers of Sage Grouse.......in the past two years, we’ve committed $112 million to this Sage Grouse Initiative in 11 states, using five separate programs.”  The money is being paid to landowners through the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, the Wildlife Habitat Incentive Program, Wetlands Reserve Program, Farm and Ranch Lands Protection Program and the Grassland Reserve Program.


"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes, and ships, and sealing wax -
Of cabbages and kings,
And why the sea is boiling hot,
And whether pigs have wings."

###