We are the future and you are the past

The European Union and Europe’s political elites are faced with many new political leaders that champion individual liberty and oppose socialism. Below you will meet 2 new European politicians that strongly oppose current European political policy.

Afroditi Latinopoulou, is a lawyer and former championship tennis player. In 2024 she established the Voice of Reason political party in Greece and was elected a member of the European Parliament. 

Afroditi Latinopoulou

Seriously ladies and gentleman, was it the right wing that destroyed industry? Was it the right wing that made an idol out of Greta Thunberg? Was it the right that imposed green energy at the expense of industry destroying the EU's competitiveness? Or was it the socialist governments that have been ruling the European Union for 50 years?

France, Italy, Germany, Spain, and my homeland Greece have been devastated by groundless socialist policies. And today you, the destroyers of Europe have the audacity to wag your finger at us claiming that we conservatives are a threat to Europe? I laugh, I truly laugh.

As Margaret Thatcher wisely said: "The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money." So abandon these ghost stories about supposed far-right threats and implement liberal economic policies. Lower taxes, increase competitiveness bring back plastic straws leave lignite [coal] alone invest in the industry and above all face reality: YOU HAVE FAILED. Follow what we're telling you before it's too late for everyone. 

You have failed. We are the future and you are the past.

Kemi Badenoch just became the first black woman to lead the UK’s Conservative Party, the oldest in British politics, colloquially known as “the Tories.” 

Kemi Badenoch

The first step is to explain the value of liberty. Our opponents do not value liberty. They see it as the freedom to do bad things, whether they are offensive or exploitative; that is all they think about. But liberty is foundational for a flourishing society, not just a philosophical “nice to have.”

The second thing we have to do is to stop the expansion of the state.

The third thing we have to do is to stop being afraid to defend our beliefs.

People should always be treated as individuals (ideologies that suggest otherwise must be passionately opposed). Due process must always be ensured (there can be no room for mob justice of any kind). The rule of law must be protected, and the law must be applied neutrally (and there can be no special treatment depending on identity).

I will die to protect those things

And it isn’t so much about being on the left or being on the right, but about finding the common ground. So I am on the right. But I also recognize that just talking about things within your own bubble is not how to win other people over. I’m able to have conversations with people who have very different philosophies because there’s a way you can speak that shows the commonality and shows that we’re all trying to get to the same place. And that’s what I’m trying to do with my party now.

There are no solutions; there are only trade-offs

In his book "Basic Economics: A Common Sense Guide to the Economy" first published in 2000, Thomas Sowell makes the following observation: "There are no solutions; there are only trade-offs."  Sowell explains that every decision involves compromises, and that recognizing and understanding these trade-offs is crucial for effective economic thinking and policy-making. 

A recent article by Jonathan Miltimore of American Institute for Economic Research (AIER) discusses how economic reality has recently impacted environmental political policy.  The article can be found at this link:

AIER-Green-Policy-in-Retreat

Highlights from this article:

A quote from a farmer at a protest in Pamplona, Spain: "They're drowning us with all these regulations.  They need to ease up on all the directives and bureaucracy.”

First, it’s becoming apparent — especially in Europe where energy is more scarce and expensive — that people are souring on Green policies.

...voters don’t actually like being told what car they must drive and how to cook their food and heat their homes. 

Green parties and environmentalists have had success largely by getting people to focus on the desired effect of their policies (saving people from climate change) and to ignore the costs of their policies.

Politicians seem to grasp that their policies come with trade-offs, which is why their bans and climate targets tend to be 10, 15, or 30 years into the future. This allows them to bask in the glow of their climate altruism without dealing with the economic consequences of their policies.

This is one of the most salient differences between economics and politics. Economics is all about understanding the reality of trade-offs, but politics is primarily about ignoring or concealing these realities.

The economic impacts of environmental political policy is discussed by Roger Pielke Jr. in the following article:

The iron law of climate policy

Highlights from this article:

Climate policy, they say, requires sacrifice, as economic growth and environmental progress are necessarily incompatible with one another. This perspective has even been built into the scenarios of the IPCC. However, experience shows quite clearly that when environmental and economic objectives are placed into opposition with one another in public or political forums, the economic goals win out. I call this the iron law of climate policy. Opinion polls show that the public is indeed willing to pay some amount for attaining environmental goals, just as it is with respect to other societal goals. However, the public has its limits as to how much it is willing to pay.

In her novel "Atlas Shrugged" Ayn Rand makes the following statement: “We can evade reality, but we cannot evade the consequences of evading reality.”  Environmental political policies are experiencing the consequences of evading economic reality.

Climate Quiz

Click on the link below to test your climate knowledge.  You will be surprised by some of the answers.

Climate Quiz

The Green New Deal

If there was any pretense that the environmental movement was only a disguise for communism, then the “Green New Deal” has exposed their true intentions.  Although the Green New Deal is a program proposed by the Green Party in previous election cycles, we have now reached a point where it will be considered as new legislation in the US House of Representatives in the next session.

 

The Green New Deal is being advanced as the last best hope to save the planet from catastrophic climate change.  This is a classic example of the statement by then Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel: "You never let a serious crisis go to waste.  And what I mean by that it's an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before."

If there is any doubt that the Green New Deal is not about climate change a brief review of its proposals are in order.  The full text of the proposed legislation can be found at this link:

The Green New Deal Proposal

These are some of the highlights:

(B) COMPOSITION. —The select committee shall be composed of 15 members appointed by the Speaker, of whom 6 may be appointed on the recommendation of the Minority Leader. The Speaker shall designate one member of the select committee as its chair. A vacancy in the membership of the select committee shall be filled in the same manner as the original appointment.

Note that the speaker in the next congress will likely be Nancy Pelosi and she would appoint 9 of 15 the members.

(i) The select committee shall have authority to develop a detailed national, industrial, economic mobilization plan (hereinafter in this section referred to as the “Plan for a Green New Deal” or the “Plan”) for the transition of the United States economy to become greenhouse gas emissions neutral and to significantly draw down greenhouse gases from the atmosphere and oceans and to promote economic and environmental justice and equality.

The last sentence tells all: “promote economic and environmental justice and equality”.  Economic equality, the concept used for over a century to pave the road to serfdom.

(B) INVESTIGATIVE JURISDICTION. —In furtherance of the mandate set forth in paragraph (2)(A), the select committee shall have the authority to investigate, study, make findings, convene experts and leaders from industry, academia, local communities, labor, finance, technology and any other industry or group that the select committee deems to be a relevant resource. The select committee may, at its discretion and as its members may deem appropriate, hold public hearings in connection with any aspect of its investigative functions.

In this section the select committee gives itself the authority to investigate any individual, business, organization, or government agency.  This is the same process used during the French revolution known as the Revolutionary Tribunal.  The Revolutionary Tribunal instituted the “Reign of Terror” using execution by guillotine to enforce its rulings.

(6) SCOPE OF THE PLAN FOR A GREEN NEW DEAL AND THE DRAFT LEGISLATION. —

 (A) The Plan for a Green New Deal (and the draft legislation) shall be developed with the objective of reaching the following outcomes within the target window of 10 years from the start of execution of the Plan:

(iii) upgrading every residential and industrial building for state-of-the-art energy efficiency, comfort and safety;

(iv) eliminating greenhouse gas emissions from the manufacturing, agricultural and other industries, including by investing in local-scale agriculture in communities across the country;

(v) eliminating greenhouse gas emissions from, repairing and improving transportation and other infrastructure, and upgrading water infrastructure to ensure universal access to clean water;

In subsection (A) (iii) the select committee grants itself the power to “upgrading every residential and industrial building”.  This is incredible.  Imagine thinking that the Federal Government will somehow remodel every structure in the USA.  Even worse, combine the new power to remodel your home with the previous power of investigation.  This would give the special committee (the SC) the right to investigate and prosecute you for not using a high efficiency washing machine.  Also, once inside your home would the SC investigate to discover unauthorized weapons?  What about unauthorized literature?

In subsections (A) (iv) and (v) the SC gives itself the authority to “eliminate” greenhouse gas emissions from “the manufacturing, agricultural and other industries”.  Note that eliminate means zero use of fossil fuels.  So, natural gas, diesel, gasoline, or coal will not be used in manufacturing, agricultural and other industries.  This same principle of elimination is applied to transportation.  How many solar/electric powered airliners will be available for this phase of the program?

Finally, in subsection (A) (v) there will be an assurance of access to clean water.  Clean water will become scarcer without access to inexpensive energy and chemicals.

(B) The Plan for a Green New Deal (and the draft legislation) shall recognize that a national, industrial, economic mobilization of this scope and scale is a historic opportunity to virtually eliminate poverty in the United States and to make prosperity, wealth and economic security available to everyone participating in the transformation. In furtherance of the foregoing, the Plan (and the draft legislation) shall:

(i) provide all members of our society, across all regions and all communities, the opportunity, training and education to be a full and equal participant in the transition, including through a job guarantee program to assure a living wage job to every person who wants one;

Subsection (B) (i) codifies a national minimum wage that would be called a living wage.  This language currently refers to a wage of $15.00 per hour.

(iii) require strong enforcement of labor, workplace safety, and wage standards that recognize the rights of workers to organize and unionize free of coercion,

Subsection (B) (iii) recognizes “the rights of workers to organize and unionize free of coercion”.  This is hilarious, as the vast majority of the coercion against workers now is applied by the unions.

(v) protect and enforce sovereign rights and land rights of tribal nations;

Subsection (B) (v) will cause some difficulties for the SC if the tribal nations decide that they want to continue drilling for oil and gas and mining for coal.

(vi) mitigate deeply entrenched racial, regional and gender-based inequalities in income and wealth (including, without limitation, ensuring that federal and other investment will be equitably distributed to historically impoverished, low income, deindustrialized or other marginalized communities in such a way that builds wealth and ownership at the community level);

Subsection (B) (vi) intends to mitigate regional inequalities in income.  Does the SC intend to bring the income levels of the lower regions up to the level of Washington DC?  Or would it be more equitable for the Washington DC region income level decline to the level of the lower income regions.?

(vii) include additional measures such as basic income programs, universal health care programs and any others as the select committee may deem appropriate to promote economic security, labor market flexibility and entrepreneurism;

Subsection (B) (vii) will bestow upon us the blessings of basic income programs and universal health care.  But those are not the only programs, we would also receive “any others as the select committee may deem appropriate to promote economic security, labor market flexibility and entrepreneurism”.  This of course is the language used to describe public ownership of the means of production.

In Section C we find this: “The Plan (and the draft legislation) shall, accordingly, ensure that the majority of financing of the Plan shall be accomplished by the federal government, using a combination of the Federal Reserve, a new public bank or system of regional and specialized public banks,”.  This means that not only will the SC seize the means of production they will also have their own banking system.

Is this a plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, or is it a plan for the Federal Government to completely and finally take over all aspects of the economy?

A very useful source of information on this subject can be found at this link:

Contra Krugman Ep. 168

Five key reasons to pull plug on wind subsidies

Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT) published an article by Larry Bell which can be viewed at this link:

Five key reasons to pull plug on wind subsidies

The five reasons are listed below, and more details for each are in the article linked above:

1. First, consider that even gargantuan wind installations covering thousands of acres generate only small amounts of unreliable power.

2. Those intermittent outputs require access to a “shadow capacity” which enables utilities to balance power grids when wind conditions aren’t optimum . . . which is most of the time. Anti-fossil energy promoters aren’t eager to mention that those “spinning reserves” (which must equal the total wind capacity) are fueled by the same sort of coal or natural gas turbines that those friendly breezes were touted to replace.

3. A major study of nearly 3,000 on-shore British wind farms found that the turbines have a very short –12- to 15-year– operating life, not the 20- to 25-year lifespans applied in politicized government and industry projections.

4. Along with high life-cycle investment and operations costs, let’s also add environmental costs to the mix. A Sierra Club official described them as giant “Cuisinarts in the sky” for bird and bat slaughters. Other local wind critics have legitimate health concerns about land-based installations. Common symptoms include headaches, nausea, sleeplessness, and ringing in ears resulting from prolonged exposure to inaudibly low “infrasound” frequencies that even penetrate walls.

5. The existence of the entire wind power industry depends upon federal subsidies.

Gone with the wind

The following article appears in the Spring 2013 issue of "Regulation", a quarterly publication from the Cato Institute.

The High Cost of Low-Value Wind Power

Subsidized wind generates the least amount of power when it is most needed.
By Jonathan A. Lesser

The entire article can be found here:

http://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/serials/files/regulation/2013/3/v36n1-8.pdf

The conclusions are as follows:

Continued subsidies for wind generation, both in the form of tax credits and mandatory renewable portfolio standards (RPS), represent bad economics and bad energy policy, for at least three reasons.

First and foremost, wind generation’s production pattern is not only volatile and unpredictable, it also has low economic value. Rather than displacing high variable-cost fossil generating resources used to meet peak demand, wind generation’s availability peaks when electricity demand is lowest. As a result, wind generation tends to displace low variable cost generation or simply forces baseload generators to pay greater amounts to inject power onto the grid because the units cannot be turned off and on cost-effectively. Thus, consumers and taxpayers are forced to subsidize low-value electricity.

Second, subsidized wind generation, like all subsidies, distorts electricity markets by artificially lowering electricity prices in the short run, but leads to higher prices in the long run. This imposes economic harm on competitive generators and consumers. Subsidies drive out competitors and increase financial uncertainty, thus raising the cost of capital for new investment in generation. In the long run, the impact of subsidies is electricity prices that are higher than what would prevail in a fully competitive market.

Third, subsidized wind generation results in additional social costs that are borne by consumers. Those costs include billions of dollars that must be spend on additional high-voltage transmission lines, which have their own adverse societal impacts, as well as additional costs that are incurred to integrate variable and intermittent wind generation onto the grid. In other words, wind generation imposes external costs on other market participants.

After 35 years of direct and indirect subsidies, there is no economic rationale for continued subsidization of wind generation. At the federal level, direct subsidies such as the federal production tax credit (PTC) should be ended immediately. Similarly, state-level subsidies, whether feed-in tariffs established by state regulators or statutory renewable portfolio standards (RPS) mandates, exacerbate market distortions and raise electricity prices, again to the detriment of consumers. These state subsidies should also be eliminated. Ultimately, continued subsidization of wind generation simply rewards a few niche generation companies and their suppliers, at the expense of the many. Given the massive federal debt and anemic U.S. economic recovery, this type of pernicious wealth redistribution cannot be justified.

Meatless Mondays

The Los Angeles City Council has taken a bold step to solve one of mankind's great problems.  On Wednesday October 24, 2012 a resolution was passed that decrees:

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that the Council of the City of Los Angeles hereby declares all Mondays as "Meatless Mondays" in support of comprehensive sustainability efforts as well as to further encourage residents to eat a more varied plant-based diet to protect their health, protect animals and protect the environment.

The local news article is at this link (note that this resolution passed unanimously) :

http://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/Los-Angeles-City-Council-Embraces-Meatless-Mondays-Vegetarian-178244541.html

If you still think that this is a joke, the original council resolution is at this link:

http://clkrep.lacity.org/onlinedocs/2012/12-1721_RESO_10-31-12.pdf

I bet that Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York is angry that he did not think of this first.

Who would have thought that the LA City Council would agree with the Vatican?  For those of you who grew up in a Catholic family Friday was our “meatless” day of the week.  Too bad that the LA City Council didn't choose Friday that way the Catholics would be leading the trend.   I guess that “meatless Mondays” has a better rhyme.  Another problem with meatless Fridays is that Hollywood loves to party on Friday night.  This would have put a damper on those glamorous celebrities.  It would not be the same standing around drinking Crystal and munching on carrot sticks.

By the way, Catholics are still required to abstain from meat on “penitential days”:

http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG1104/__P4O.HTM

Canon  1250 The penitential days and times in the universal Church are every Friday of the whole year and the season of Lent.
Canon  1251 Abstinence from meat, or from some other food as determined by the Episcopal Conference, is to be observed on all Fridays, unless a solemnity should fall on a Friday. Abstinence and fasting are to be observed on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday.

It appears that the environmental and vegetarian movements have now formally become a religion.  Now they only need to appoint a high priest (or maybe a pope).  My vote goes to Al Gore (lately he looks like he could really use the meatless days).

If I wanted America to fail

With the recent celebration of "Earth Day" this is a good time to reflect on the evolution of the environmental movement. April 22, 1970 was the first "Earth Day" event. In 1970 The primary goals of the environmental movement were clean air and clean water. These were goals that were easily embraced by a majority of citizens. These goals gave birth to a new federal agency, the Environmental Protection Agency. Today the goals of the environmental movement have dramatically strayed from its origins.

Today the environmental movement has transformed into anti-capitalist fascism. The following video describes the consequences:

If I wanted America to fail

Consensus science

On 3/28/12 fifty former NASA employees signed a letter to Charles Bolden, Jr., NASA Administrator.  The letter requests NASA to refrain from making claims that CO2 is impacting global climate.  The fifty employees that signed this letter have a combined total of over 1,000 years of professional experience.  The entire letter can be read at this link:

NASA employees letter

The following are some of the highlights:

We believe the claims by NASA and GISS (Goddard Institute For Space Studies), that man-made carbon dioxide is having a catastrophic impact on global climate change are not substantiated, especially when considering thousands of years of empirical data. With hundreds of well-known climate scientists and tens of thousands of other scientists publicly declaring their disbelief in the catastrophic forecasts, coming particularly from the GISS leadership, it is clear that the science is NOT settled.

 As former NASA employees, we feel that NASA’s advocacy of an extreme position, prior to a thorough study of the possible overwhelming impact of natural climate drivers is inappropriate. We request that NASA refrain from including unproven and unsupported remarks in its future releases and websites on this subject. At risk is damage to the exemplary reputation of NASA, NASA’s current or former scientists and employees, and even the reputation of science itself.

Why is this important?  We have seen other letters and petitions authored and signed by noteworthy scientist who question the link between man-made CO2 and global climate change.  This letter is important because Dr. James Hansen, director of GISS is one of the most outspoken advocates in favor of government action to restrict CO2 emissions.  Dr. Hansen's congressional testimony in 1988 began the political process of regulating CO2 emissions.  The fact that Dr. Hansen's peers now are publicly calling for him to "cease and desist" is stunning.

Among the many who signed this letter are 8 astronauts and 2 Flight Directors.  These are not people who make decisions without research and thought about the consequences.  One of the Flight Directors who signed the letter is Dr. Christopher C. Kraft who spent 24 years as Flight Director and Director of Johnson Space Center.  Dr. Kraft was Flight Director for the Apollo 13 mission.  He was responsible for the engineering decisions that save the lives of the crew after an explosion on the spacecraft in route to the moon.

The letter finishes with the following:

For additional information regarding the science behind our concern, we recommend that you contact Harrison Schmitt or Walter Cunningham, or others they can recommend to you.

Dr. Harrison Schmitt is a former astronaut who left NASA to serve as a US Senator from New Mexico.  He now teaches at University of Wisconsin.  Walter Cunningham is also a former astronaut.  Walter Cunningham writes a blog titled "Space Views".  This post from his blog is very well written:

Climate change alarmists ignore scientific methods

This post should be read in its entirety.  The following are some of the highlights:

The question of human caused global warming should not be resolved on the publicized opinions of influential journalists, but in the court of scientific inquiry, based on the scientific data.

It is the job of science to develop the theories that explain our natural world. Scientific, theories, even those that evolved over centuries, are subject to challenge and change—when supported by the appropriate scientific data. This enables new hypotheses to modify, or even replace currently accepted “theories.”

For a new hypothesis to be accepted by the scientific community, it must be confirmed by considerable evidence and must survive all attempts to disprove it. The hypothesis claiming that human-generated carbon dioxide is a principal driver of the earth’s temperature has not satisfied either of these criteria.

Global warming alarmists could have made their case quite simply by 1) collecting and making available solid evidence to support their hypothesis, and 2) by defending it in the court of scientific inquiry, not in the court of public opinion. Instead, they refused to release their data that would permit other scientists to replicate their results--if possible. 

Modern science has expanded human knowledge by extensive use of peer review.  Any new discovery or theory is published along with all supporting methods and data.  Then independent researchers try to duplicate the results.  If confirmed by independent experiment the new discovery or theory is accepted as valid.  Man-made global climate change has never been submitted to independent peer review.  The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has resisted all requests to allow peer review of the models or data used to make its prediction.  The IPCC has instead resorted to promoting its theory as consensus science.

Consensus science was the leading method for scientific discovery throughout much of history.  In 1491 consensus science believed that the earth was flat.  In 1542 the consensus in science was that the earth was the center of the universe and that the sun orbited the earth.

It is time for IPCC and the rest of the man-made global climate change alarmists to submit their theories, models, and data for peer review.

Human Achievement Hour

The Competitive Enterprise Institute is organizing a celebration of human achievement to take place on Saturday 3/31/12.  The details are at this link:

http://cei.org/hah

On March 31, some people will be sitting in the dark to express their "vote" for action on global climate change. Instead, you can join CEI and the thousands of people around the world who will be celebrating Human Achievement Hour (HAH). Leave your lights on to express your appreciation for the inventions and innovations that make today the best time to be alive and the recognition that future solutions require individual freedom not government coercion.


Human Achievement Hour (HAH) is a celebration of individual freedom and appreciation of the achievements and innovations that people have used to improve their lives throughout history. To celebrate Human Achievement Hour, participants need only to spend the hour from 8:30 pm to 9:30 pm (local time)  on March 31 enjoying the benefits of capitalism and human innovation: Gather with friends in the warmth of a heated home, watch television, take a hot shower, drink a cold beer, call a loved one on the phone, or listen to music.

You can also utilize one of man’s greatest achievements, the Internet, to join CEI’s in-house party, which will live stream at http://cei.org/hah beginning at 8:00 pm EST. You can use the chat function to tell us how you are celebrating human achievement in your neighborhood.


On Saturday March 31, 2012, from 8:30 pm to 9:30 pm, some people will shut off their lights and spend an hour in darkness as a symbolic vote against global climate change. Observers of Earth Hour want world leaders to “do something” about pollution and energy use.  What this means is that they want politicians to use legal mandates and punitive taxes to prevent individuals from freely using resources, hindering our ability to create the solutions and technologies of the future. Instead, the Competitive Enterprise Institute asks you to spend that hour with your lights *on* in celebration of Human Achievement Hour.

HAH is an annual event meant to recognize and celebrate the fact that this is the greatest time to be alive, and that the reason we have reached this point is that people have been free to use their minds and the resources in their environment to experiment, create, and innovate. Participants in HAH recognize the necessity to protect the individual persons from government coercion, so that we may continue innovating and improving our lives and the world around us.

Government grants distort scientific research

During a recent conversation with one of my friends a question arose:

Why would respected academics and scientists intentionally distribute false scientific results?

The following article answers this question:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6999975.ece


Theses excerpts from the above article are of interest:

• The chairman of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), has used bogus claims that Himalayan glaciers were melting to win grants worth hundreds of thousands of pounds.
• Rajendra Pachauri's Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), based in New Delhi, was awarded up to £310,000 by the Carnegie Corporation of New York and the lion's share of a £2.5m EU grant funded by European taxpayers. It means that EU taxpayers are funding research into a scientific claim about glaciers that any ice researcher should immediately recognise as bogus. The revelation comes just a week after The Sunday Times highlighted serious scientific flaws in the IPCC's 2007 benchmark report on the likely impacts of global warming.
• The IPCC had warned that climate change was likely to melt most of the Himalayan glaciers by 2035 - an idea considered ludicrous by most glaciologists. Last week a humbled IPCC retracted that claim and corrected its report.
• The cash was acknowledged by TERI in a press release, issued on January 15, just before the glacier scandal became public, in which Pachauri repeated the claims of imminent glacial melt. It said: ""According to predictions of scientific merit they may indeed melt away in several decades."
  The same release also quoted Dr Syed Hasnain, the glaciologist who, back in 1999, made the now discredited claim that Himalayan glaciers would be gone by 2035.
  He now heads Pachauri's glaciology unit at TERI which sought the grants and which is carrying out the glacier research.
• Critics point out that Hasnain, of all people, should have known the claim that the Himalayan glaciers could melt by 2035 was bogus because he was meant to be a leading glaciologist specialising in the Himalayas.
• Any suggestion that TERI has repeated an unchecked scientific claim without checking it, in order to win grants, could prove hugely embarrassing for Pachauri and the IPCC.

Grant money is the lifeblood of scientific research. The flow of government grants are controlled by politicians and bureaucrats who have political agendas. These political agendas dictate who receives the grants. If you accept grant money and then publish results that conflict with the political agenda your grant flow will cease.

Subsidies for the politically connected

The following article by Robert Bryce discusses corn based ethanol and plug in electric vehicles:

http://www.energytribune.com/articles.cfm?aid=2485

The following paragraphs explain how the “Green Movement” works:

• Then again, the entire electric car push may just be another over-hyped flavor-of-the-month whose main effect will be the transfer of billions of dollars from the pockets of taxpayers to the coffers of politically favored industries that have effective lobbyists in Washington.
• Among the most notable recipients of the government’s largesse: Fisker Automotive. In September 2009, Fisker received a $529 million loan from the US government to help finance its startup costs. One of Fisker’s main financial backers is the venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, a Silicon Valley firm where Al Gore is a partner.

If a thorough audit of any Government subsidy to industry is carried out you will find some type of unsavory relationship. There will always be someone who can benefit from convincing the Government that their industry is promoting the “common good”. Government should never fund private enterprise.

"Is that about the coolest thing you've ever heard?"

Where is another example of why the Federal Government should never be allowed to spend our money. This is a story from the Wall Street Journal published on 10/17/09:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704107204574473724099542430.html

The details of this fiasco would once again be funny if not for the fact that we are paying for this nonsense:

• 
  We thought cash for clunkers was the ultimate waste of taxpayer money, but as usual we were too optimistic. Thanks to the federal tax credit to buy high-mileage cars that was part of President Obama's stimulus plan, Uncle Sam is now paying Americans to buy that great necessity of modern life, the golf cart.
• The federal credit provides from $4,200 to $5,500 for the purchase of an electric vehicle, and when it is combined with similar incentive plans in many states the tax credits can pay for nearly the entire cost of a golf cart. Even in states that don't have their own tax rebate plans, the federal credit is generous enough to pay for half or even two-thirds of the average sticker price of a cart, which is typically in the range of $8,000 to $10,000. "The purchase of some models could be absolutely free," Roger Gaddis of Ada Electric Cars in Oklahoma said earlier this year. "Is that about the coolest thing you've ever heard?"
• The golf-cart boom has followed an IRS ruling that golf carts qualify for the electric-car credit as long as they are also road worthy. These qualifying golf carts are essentially the same as normal golf carts save for adding some safety features, such as side and rearview mirrors and three-point seat belts. They typically can go 15 to 25 miles per hour.
• This golf-cart fiasco perfectly illustrates tax policy in the age of Obama, when politicians dole out credits and loopholes for everything from plug-in cars to fuel efficient appliances, home insulation and vitamins. Democrats then insist that to pay for these absurdities they have no choice but to raise tax rates on other things—like work and investment—that aren't politically in vogue. If this keeps up, it'll soon make more sense to retire and play golf than work for living.

It is easy to attribute this policy to “unintended consequences” from a large federal spending program. I think that some research would lead to a different conclusion. I believe that the wording of this federal law was intentionally vague so that those who were positioned to gain from the sale of these vehicles would directly benefit from this legislation.
Imagine the “unintended consequences” that have been inserted into the 1,500 page health care legislation.

"an undue burden"

Would it surprise you to learn that EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson has no grasp of basic economics? This news article gives us her perspective:

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_EPA_GREENHOUSE_GASES?SITE=OHWIL&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

Here is her view of economic interactions:

• "By using the power and authority of the Clean Air Act, we can begin reducing emissions from the nation's largest greenhouse gas-emitting facilities without placing an undue burden on the businesses that make up the vast majority of our economy," EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said. "We know the corner coffee shop is no place to look for meaningful carbon reductions."

In her mind raising the costs for large industries has no effect on small business. Maybe she intends to subsidize the increased costs of raw materials, electricity, and transportation that will be borne by all small businesses.

"Capitalism is the prime enemy of earth and the entire humanity"

The President of Bolivia is providing us with extraordinary insight into the environmental movement and the global warming agenda. In an interview today after his UN speech president, Evo Morales of Bolivia reiterated that “Capitalism is the prime enemy of earth and the entire humanity ‘‘.

In a press conference held in New York on the sideline of the UN special meeting on climate change, president, Morales said: “Climate change phenomenon is a product of capitalism that seeks to gain the greatest possible profit at others expense “.

The ultimate goal of the climate change agenda is the destruction of free markets and the installation of government control over your economic decisions. We are fortunate that there are members of this coalition like Mr. Morales who are willing to tell the truth.

Mystery of fish mercury levels solved

Another claim of a man made environmental disaster turns out to be false:

http://www.starbulletin.com/news/20090922_Mystery_of_fish_mercury_levels_solved.html

Here are the facts as outlined in the above article:

• Kaneko said there is an assumption that mercury in open-ocean fish is directly related to atmospheric mercury emissions and pollution, but there is no evidence of that.
• Studies done in 1971 and again in 1998 on the amount of mercury in Hawaii yellowfin tuna showed no differences despite a 26 percent increase in atmospheric mercury emissions, he said.
• Mercury is a natural trace element in the environment that has never been associated with toxicity in Hawaii's ocean fish, said Kaneko, whose research focuses on public health.
• But methylmercury, an organic form of the mineral converted by bacteria, can be toxic if eaten at high levels by animals or people.
• Kaneko said there is substantial scientific evidence that high levels of selenium in ocean fish counteract toxic levels of mercury. Selenium, also a natural element, has antioxidant functions and is known to bind to mercury, he said. "When those two elements bind together, they're biologically inert.
• "What we're finding, in some research we're just finishing now, is it's the ratios of mercury to selenium that is more important than the amount of mercury in fish," Kaneko added.

Rising mercury levels in the ocean food chain is one of the arguments used against burning coal. This study debunks that argument. If this study had confirmed that man’s activities are raising the levels of mercury you would hear about it insistently in the media. I predict that this study will be buried by the media.

How Wishful Thinkers Are Forced To Reconnect With Energy Reality

The following article was published on 9/10/09 on the Investors.com website:

http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=505738

This article lists several examples of governments saying one thing and then doing exactly the opposite when reality sets in. Here are a few of the best examples:

• One day Energy Secretary Ed Milliband sets out his proposed expansion of the U.K.'s wind power-led alternative energy revolution; the next day, Vestas, the U.K.'s largest wind turbine manufacturer, shuts down a big part of its British operations citing "low demand" and public opposition to onshore wind farms.
• In 2006, Germany's Angela Merkel was hailed as the "Green Chancellor" for promising to rid her country of coal and nuclear power in its bid to give a clean energy "world lead." Three years on and Merkel's government actively supports the construction of a new generation of 26 coal-fired power plants as well as keeping Germany's nuclear power stations open.
• "Capitalism and consumerism have brought the world to the brink of economic and environmental collapse," the U.K.'s Prince of Wales ruminates, adding that "the age of convenience is over." As international columnist Mark Steyn comments, "The Prince then got in his limo and was driven to his other palace."
• As we have seen, however, national leaders will ultimately refuse to impoverish their industries even to "save the planet." The still-"disconnected" flower-power generation and its idealistic offspring would do well to grasp that the energy future is not green. It is hydrocarbon, and will continue to be for another century at least.

The truth about Global Warming that the EPA is trying to suppress

Al McGartland, Office Director of EPA’s National Center for Environmental Economics (NCEE) has suppressed the release of a study that directly contradicts the justification for Cap and Trade legislation and the entire hypothesis of Global Warming.

The study at the center of this controversy was authored by Dr. Alan Carlin, Senior Operations Research Analyst at NCEE. Dr. Carlin’s education and employment resume are as follows:

Education
Ph.D., Economics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA
B.S., Physics, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA

Employment
Senior Economist, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, DC, 1971 to present
Economist, The RAND Corporation, Santa Monica, CA, 1963-71.

Note that Dr. Carlin has been employed at the EPA since 1971.

The study can be found at the following:

http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/endangermentcommentsv7b1.pdf

I strongly urge you to read the Executive Summary beginning on page 6 (page v as printed) of this study. All of the Executive Summary is of significance but the following sections are of major importance:

"As of the best information I currently have, the GHG/CO2 hypothesis as to the cause of global warming, which this Draft TSD supports, is currently an invalid hypothesis from a scientific viewpoint because it fails a number of critical comparisons with available observable data. Any one of these failings should be enough to invalidate the hypothesis; the breadth of these failings leaves no other possible conclusion based on current data....The failings are listed below in decreasing order of importance in my view:"

1. Lack of observed upper tropospheric heating in the tropics (see Section 2.9 for a detailed discussion).

2. Lack of observed constant humidity levels, a very important assumption of all the IPCC models, as CO2levels have risen (see Section 1.7).

3. The most reliable sets of global temperature data we have, using satellite microwave sounding units, show no appreciable temperature increases during the critical period 1978-1997, just when the surface station data show a pronounced rise (see Section 2.4). Satellite data after 1998 is also inconsistent with the GHG/CO2/AGW hypothesis.

4. The models used by the IPCC do not take into account or show the most important ocean oscillations which clearly do affect global temperatures, namely, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation, and the ENSO (Section 2.4). Leaving out any major potential causes for global warming from the analysis results in the likely misattribution of the effects of these oscillations to the GHGs/CO2 and hence is likely to overstate their importance as a cause for climate change.

5. The models and the IPCC ignored the possibility of indirect solar variability (Section 2.5), which if important would again be likely to have the effect of overstating the importance of GHGs/CO2.

6. The models and the IPCC ignored the possibility that there may be other significant natural effects on global temperatures that we do not yet understand (Section 2.4). This possibility invalidates their statements that one must assume anthropogenic sources in order to duplicate the temperature record. The 1998 spike in global temperatures is very difficult to explain in any other way (see Section 2.4).

7. Surface global temperature data may have been hopelessly corrupted by the urban heat island effect and other problems which may explain some portion of the warming that would otherwise be attributed to GHGs/CO2. In fact, the Draft TSD refers almost exclusively in Section 5 to surface rather than satellite data.

The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) has filed comments with the EPA. Those comments contain the complete text of emails from McGartland to Dr. Carlin. The comments can be reviewed at this link:

http://cei.org/cei_files/fm/active/0/Endangerment%20Comments%206-23-09.pdf

The highlights of these emails are as follows:

1) a March 12 email from Al McGartland, Office Director of EPA’s National Center for Environmental Economics (NCEE), to Alan Carlin, Senior Operations Research Analyst at NCEE,forbidding him from speaking to anyone outside NCEE on endangerment issues;

2) a March 16 email from Mr. Carlin to another NCEE economist, with a cc to Mr. McGartland and two other NCEE staffers, requesting that his study be forwarded to EPA’s Office of Air and Radiation, which directs EPA’s climate change program. The email notes the quantity of peer-reviewed references in the study, and defends its inclusion of new research as well. It states Mr. Carlin’s view that “the critical attribute of good science is its correspondence to observable data rather than where it appears in the technical literature.” It goes on to point out that the new studies “explain much of the observational data that have been collected which cannot be explained by the IPCC models.”

3) a March 17 email from Mr. McGartland to Mr. Carlin, stating that he will not forward Mr. Carlin’s study. “The time for such discussion of fundamental issues has passed for this round. The administrator and the administration has decided to move forward on endangerment, and your comments do not help the legal or policy case for this decision.
…. I can only see one impact of your comments given where we are in the process, and that would be a very negative impact on our office.” (Emphasis added);

4) a second March 17 email from Mr. McGartland to Mr. Carlin, dated eight minutes later, stating “ I don’t want you to spend any additional EPA time on climate change.”

The Heritage Foundation has published an interview with Dr. Carlin tilted “An Inconvenient Voice”. This interview can be found here:

http://blog.heritage.org/2009/06/29/an-inconvenient-voice-dr-alan-carlin/

The following are quotes from the Heritage Foundation interview:

• EPA responded by burying the report. As for Dr. Carlin himself, he was put under a strict gag order by superiors. They forbade him from writing, speaking or e-mailing about global warming to anyone outside his group at EPA.
• 
  We spoke to an embattled Dr. Carlin on the phone today, and, though he does fear losing his job because of his opinion, he has the strength of his beliefs. He told us that in 40 years of working for the government, he can’t remember any other time such pressure has been put on him.
• 
  “I’ve been involved in public policy since 1966 or 1967,” he said. “There’s never been anything exactly like this. I am now under a gag order.”
• 
  As for travel, “it’s been made abundantly clear that I was not to attend anything to do with climate change.” When he did attend a conference in Washington that was open to the public, he was reprimanded by a superior who told Dr. Carlin that he had “shown poor judgment” in daring to ask a question.
• 
  Dr. Carlin’s problems are far from unique. He is one of many who pay the price of Al Gore’s insistence that “the science is settled” on climate change, that we should no longer debate the issue. The media has happily gone along with this suppression. News reports present the questionable relationship between carbon dioxide and climate change as absolute fact. Skeptics are derided as “deniers” and are treated in the same way Galileo was by the Inquisition for suggesting the Earth revolved around the Sun. Today in President Obama’s America, a modern day Galileo has been told to shut up and go away.

If you would like to support the Competitive Enterprise Institute follow this link:
http://cei.org/support

Cap and Trade

A vote will be held on 6/26/09 to discharge the “Cap and Trade” legislation from the House Committee on Energy and Commerce and will send this bill to the House floor for a vote. This bill would enact the largest tax increase in the history of the US. Estimates of the taxes and mandated costs range from $800 billion to $2 trillion dollars over the life of the bill. The official title of this bill is H.R. 2454, American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009. This bill is also known as the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill.

Raising taxes may be the least damaging aspect of this bill. This law will give the Federal Government the authority to set the level of production across all industries. Socialists have always wanted to set the level of wages and production to control the economy. The bill to repeal union certification elections will allow the government to set wages. Now the cap and trade legislation will provide the means to set production. The USA will finally become a “workers’ paradise”.

This bill also provides a provision which imposes stiff tariffs on our trading partners if they don't adopt aggressive carbon restrictions of their own. Thus solving one of the great dilemmas suffered by organized labor, “how do we eliminate foreign competition?” This is the 21st century equivalent to the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930. The Waxman-Markey will by itself recreate 2 of the 3 policies of the 1930’s that caused the great depression, 1 - raise taxes and 2 - start a trade war. Brilliant!

The following is an enlightening discussion:

http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=10313

The complete wording of the bill is at the following link:

http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=111_cong_bills&docid=f:h2454ih.txt.pdf

See the cost estimate for this legislation at the Congressional Budget Office website:

http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/102xx/doc10262/hr2454.pdf

Take action against this bill:

http://ga1.org/campaign/0906capandtradetaxhike

Green Banking

“Green Banking”: providing a new opportunity to fleece the banking system:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-tue-green-banking-jun16,0,6719434.story

Consider these policies:

• The banks are marketing Earth-friendly policies such as lower interest rates on loans to green builders and borrowers who buy fuel-efficient cars, as well as incentives to depositors who opt out of paper statements.

• Redstone Bank, which was renamed Green Bank in 2007, emphasizes home-efficiency projects. For example, a green home-improvement loan with a principal of at least $200,000 will receive annual rewards of $500. The bank's Web site outlines required improvements, including water-saving dual-flush toilets.

What happened to the concept of making loans based on the ability to repay? "Green Banking" will make the “liar loans” of the last debacle seem reasonable.