Cap and Trade Regulates the Essential Element of Life

Not especially well written, but certainly contains a lot of useful information, The Regulation of the Essential Elements of Life by Lonnie E. Schubert is in the American Thinker today. Schubert comes at it from a slightly different angle, but essentially it is the "giggle test" so extolled by my former boss. An example:

Please, the simple fact is that carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is roughly in equilibrium with carbon dioxide dissolved in the oceans. Carbon dioxide concentration will necessarily rise in the atmosphere as the average ocean temperature rises. To ensure I am clear, global warming causes a rise in carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere. The causation is the same in the laboratory. Again, think back to your freshman and sophomore physics labs. Carbon dioxide comes out of the carbonated beverage as it warms. If it is kept chilled, it retains much more of its carbonation. Solubility is inversely proportional to temperature for carbon dioxide in water. Colder oceans absorb more carbon dioxide removing it from the atmosphere. Warmer oceans will not hold the carbon dioxide, and atmospheric concentrations go up.

Perhaps it is nonintuitive that all of our fossil fuels came from carbon dioxide that was once in the air and was subsequently converted to biological material through photosynthesis. Our fossil fuels are simply carbon dioxide concentrated by solar energy and earth forces so we can easily use it now. It is simply unreasonable to suppose it to be catastrophic to place this carbon back into the atmosphere from whence it came.

As Upton Sinclair said, "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!"

In other words, the Goofball Wormening proponents want you to believe them, and not your own lying eyes. A little known factoid included in the above article is that the increase in fossil fuel use can be attributed solely to the increase in population. Interestingly, with our population being so large, we experience dense traffic every day because most of us live in or around cities. We get a distorted view of how much fossil fuel is being used. But in the United States, only 6% of the land area is developed, meaning has buildings and such on it. In Illinois and Indiana several years ago, I traveled for miles on interstate highways without seeing an on coming car. Out west, there are roads where one could wait for days for another traveler to come by. I once read a statistic that if all the oil that was ever pumped were to be put in one spot, it would fill Lake Tahoe. I could go on, but you get the point.

The point is that the cry of Goofball Wormening has nothing to do with science, or common sense. Gaia is not mad at us, and will not punish us. Instead, this is a power grab by people who want to control our lives, to control how much and where we can travel, form where we can get goods and services, and so much more. In the process, they plan to profit mightily on our backs. Don't let them.

Update: One of the facts pointed out in the above article is that the percentage carbon dioxide in the atmosphere rises and falls in response to average temperature of the oceans. It is a lagging indicator; or the earth warms and then carbon dioxide rises. As the earth again cools, which it is doing now, carbon dioxide goes back down. So here's a prediction. If cap and trade is implemented, the earth, already cooling, will continue to cool, and CO2 will go down. This will be pointed to as showing the success of cap and trade. It will not be true, but "the people who care and are empathetic" will want to believe it because it shows their sacrifices have saved the planet. Once again, conservatives will be the bad guys for pointing out the facts. Conservatives will have no credibility because "the people who care and are empathetic" don't want to hear facts.

And If A "Consensus of "Experts" Told You to Jump off a Cliff?

Goofball Warming or Climate Change as proponents of the former like to style it now, has been a cause of mine since the first Kyoto Treaty was signed. Mark Hendrickson has a good explanation of the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and how it works (or doesn't) in this piece titled A Closer Look at Climate Change.

The IPCC’s Feb. 2007 report stated: It is “very likely” that human activity is causing global warming. Why then, just two months later, did the Vice Chair of the IPCC, Yuri Izrael, write, “the panic over global warming is totally unjustified;” “there is no serious threat to the climate;” and humanity is “hypothetically … more threatened by cold than by global warming?”

So what explains how an individual sitting on the IPCC, a Vice Chair, say just the opposite?

The policymakers’ summaries are presented as the “consensus” of 2,500 scientists who have contributed input to the IPCC’s scientific reports. “Consensus” does NOT mean that all of the scientists endorse the policymakers’ summaries. In fact, some of the 2,500 scientists have resigned in protest against those summaries. Other contributing scientists, such as the individuals quoted above, publicly contradict the assertions of the policymakers’ summaries.

Just so we are clear, "consensus" has no place in determining scientific truth. Newton did not seek consensus when he published his laws of motion. Instead these were the result of individual effort, that was confirmed by other scientists who saw that his laws worked by putting them to the test. Today, we know that Newtons "laws" only hold for a spectrum of reality, and that Einstein's laws become more descriptive as thing speed up. Einstein's theories were initially rejected. Scientists devised experiments which would prove him wrong, only to discover he had been right. But few people think of Einstein's Theory of General Relativity as a "law."

From Anthony Watt's site "WattsUpWithThat" there is this quote. go read the whole thing. Indeed, bookmark the site and refer to it often.

In order to support a theory, specific predictions need to be made that are based on the claims of the theory, and the predictions then need to happen.
While the occurrence of the predicted events is not proof positive of a theory, they increase the believability of the claims. However, if the predictions are not observed, this tends to indicate the theory is flawed or even wrong. Some predictions are absolute in nature. Einstein’s prediction of the bending of light by the Sun is such a case. It either would or would not bend, and this was considered a critical test of the validity of his theory of general relativity. It did bend the predicted amount, and supported his theory.

So what then is the reason for claiming a "consensus" of scientists agree to this if a "consensus" has no meaning here? Well, of course it is to bully the public, with the help of the MSM into believing we must act now. It is, in other words, another made up "crisis." Mark Hendrikson again:

The sponsors of the IPCC, the United Nations, and liberal American politicians all share the goal of reducing Americans’ wealth by capping our consumption of energy with a binding international climate change treaty. They are willing to resort to scientific fraud to further their goal. In the words of Al Gore’s ally, former Under-Secretary of State Tim Wirth, “Even if the theory of global warming is wrong, we will be doing the right thing” by reducing Americans’ consumption of fossil fuels. Keep that in mind whenever the IPCC is cited in support of a climate treaty.

When I was receiving my first indoctrination training on goofball warmening, I asked a buddy, an "expert" from one of our field offices, "If the theory is correct how does it explain the dramatically warmer and cooler temperatures that existed in prehistoric times? Where were the SUVs then?" That question has never been answered.

For the true believers, those who buy into the myth of Gaia, the "ecology" is on a knife edge. Cut down a single tree that happens to be the only habitat for some rare butterfly, and the whole thing unravels. In this myth, man must not do anything which might disturb the delicate balance lest we destroy everything. However, for those of us who believe that God created the universe, and this planet specifically for us, and knowing who and what we are before he created us, the earth is probably immune to man's undoing. Einstein said it best: "God does not play dice with the universe."

For more information, please read: Richard Lindzen's The Origin and Nature of the Alleged Scientific Consensus and bookmark this site: Science and Environmental Policy Project.

I'm Not Saying Obama is Hitler...Just sayin'

Oh good, because then the debate is over. But Rachel Marsden has a point in her latest article on Townhall.com entitled Obama Not the First Head of State to Design Cars. A quote:

“Sitting at a restaurant table in Munich in the summer of 1932, Hitler designed the prototype for what would become the immensely successful Beetle design for Volkswagen (literally, the "car of the people"),” says the Hitler Historical Museum’s website. He then said to the head of Daimler-Benz: “Take it with you and speak with people who understand more about it than I do. But don't forget it. I want to hear from you soon, about the technical details."

Ms. Marsden points out that people around the world are jealous of American cars:

“Americans just have to get out of their big cars,” a French friend sighed to me recently.

“Yeah, I’m sure your girlfriends find it really sexy that you can ‘lift’ your scooter into its parking spot and that they have to take the subway to meet up with you on your dates,” I replied.

So, to keep everyone from being so jealous, we'll just have to drive smaller rollerskates like everyone else. I wonder if the smaller bit applies to Beverly Hills mansions? Nah...

That’s environmental paranoia in a nutshell for you. It isn’t really about the environment, it’s about control. You, too, are going to be forced to look as stupid as the guy pulling ten canvas bags out of his faux leather man-purse. If you dare show up at any grocery store in Toronto, Canada, without your own ratty, reused bags, you’ll be charged five cents for each one – a tax on your audacity, collected by the City.

So, in Rachel Marsden's formulation, the nerds (you know, the guys who play Dungeons and Dragons instead of doing something useful) are now in charge, and they are going to force you, with a gun to your head, to look as nerdy as they do.

Oh, and that bit about Hitler? She isn't saying Obama is Hitler or anything-just noting a similarity, that's all.

Mother Gaia strikes again

First up, how about a little cartoon here. Liked that? How about another here. Ok, now for some text to go along with that. Steve Milloy has an article over at the Financial Post entitled Mileage Standards Deadlier Than Iraq. A quote:

Obama’s standards will require automakers to meet a 35 miles-per-gallon standard by 2016 — four years earlier than the same standard imposed by the Energy Security and Independence Act of 2007. The only way for carmakers to meet these standard is to make smaller, lighter and deadlier cars.

The National Academy of Sciences has linked mileage standards with about 2,000 deaths per year. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimates that every 100-pound reduction in the weight of small cars increases annual traffic fatalities by as much as 715. In contrast in the more than six years since the Iraq war began, there have been 4,296 deaths among American military personnel...

So, "The One" must have in mind that Americans will get something in exchange for taking bigger and bigger risks while on the road. Something? Anything?

Well, no, at least as you or I would calculate such things.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency — for the purposes of risk assessment — values a single human life at $6.9-million. So under the new mileage standards, it would cost about $35-million per day in human lives (not including non-fatal injuries) to save $5-million in gas.

But you have the joy of knowing that you are saving Gaia by your sacrifices to her. And if she demands a child? Well you can just think how special you are. But don't expect "The One" to sacrifice one of his, or AlGore, or any of the other bigwigs who tell you or I that we have to. They are "too big to fail." Warms to cockles of your heart doesn't it.

Update: Dan Gainor has an article over at Townhall.com entitled
If It's A Smart Car, Why Does It Look So Stupid. He discusses the "Smart Car's" minuses:

You would think it would. The Smart car is the kind of vehicle only a liberal or a guy who parks his car in a closet could love – because it gets decent gas mileage, is half the size of real car, has none of the space of a popular but evil SUV and won’t let you drive over 90 mph. (In the car’s defense, you’d probably have to fall off a cliff to hit 90 with two people inside – though if you are forced to drive one of these, you might wish that result.)

The Smart Car and its equally ridiculous hybrid friends matter because they might be all that’s left on the roads after Democrats destroy what remains of the American automotive industry.

So now let's look at some unintended consequences. The market for these rollerskates is incredibly small, certainly not enough to sustain a giant company like General Motors. People will do all sorts of things to avoid them, like keeping their current cars operating long past their economic prime. Once parts are no longer available, I suspect manufacturers will develop an after market of parts to keep the old war horses running. The J. C. Whitney catalog will expand exponentially. Mechanically gifted individuals will start thriving shops repairing older cars, and possibly putting what once were treated as "Project cars" together from the wrecking yards to sell to people who want a real car.

Of course, all this will enrage the Saviors of Gaia. They will want new laws with more teeth. For example, making everyone document their need for larger vehicles. If you don't need it, they will argue, you will have to buy one of the "Smart Cars" or go to jail on Federal Felony charges. The paper work to get one of these rollerskates will be so long, and tedious that it will make buying a car the traditional way seem like a walk in the park. This is always what happens. First the soft tyranny, which never works because it goes against the natural grain. "But it's for your own good" they will cajole. Then comes ever more tyrannical and intrusive laws to MAKE you do it. "Well, if the public won't do it for altruistic reasons, then we will force you to do it."

Then again, maybe Honda or Toyota will still be allowed to make real cars, since they haven't taken any of the government's money (yet.) Could be that as long as it isn't an American company making a profit, it will be alright.

Driving Rollerskates

David Harsanyi has a marvelous article, dripping with sarcasm up entitled Coming to Your Garage: Le Car over at Townhall.com. Take a peek.

The United States government, if you haven't noticed, owns the auto manufacturing industry, props up the last vestiges of "labor" and soon will bail out the failed state of California. So this harmonizing of disparate interests is what a gracious person might call a "conflict of interest" and an honest person refers to as "racketeering."

Let's, for a moment, stretch the limits of our imaginations and make believe that a Republican candidate won the most recent presidential election. Let's pretend he or she continued the Bush administration's policy of bailing out Detroit, as Obama has done. Imagine, then, that all of these state-backed parties came together to "support" legislation mandating the increased production of SUVs.

I object, in the most strenuous of terms to being forced, by government dictate, to drive a rollerskate because some people, of whose opinion I do not think much, believe that I need to change my way of life, while they fly around in private jets and live in mansions that emit more goofball warmening gases in a week than my place does in a couple of months. So yes, "racketeering" is the word for it. Perhaps they need to be prosecuted under the RICO act? Is it too early to talk about impeachment?

Goofball Wormening Has Been Cancelled

Tomorrow is "Earth Day," that glorious day when pagans everywhere celebrate and glorify the creation, and not the Creator. The pagans even have a name for their god; they call it "Gaia." How cute.

Meanwhile, Bill Steigerwald has an interview with Anthony Watts, of WattsUpWithThat.com. Anthony is a former television meteorologist who has used actual science to debunk many of the claims of Hollyweird actresses, and even Jim Hanson, about goofball wormening. Go read with Watts has to say, and go to his erudite website and read what is going on there as well.

For myself, I have read much of the scientific data, and I have understood some of it, but not all by any stretch. One thing I did discover is that the earth has been much warmer, and much colder than it is today, and it survived (!!!). Species like the alligator, the cockroach and mosquito survived these times virtually unchanged. In historical times it has been warmer and cooler. During the medieval warming, it got warm enough that Greenland was actually green, and wine grapes grew in the British Isles. (The SUV was invented some hundreds of years later, as a matter of historical record.) During the revolutionary war, snow was common both in Virginia and North Carolina. Today it is a rarity. Who is to say that the climate as it exists today is the ideal climate, and that all the others were not?

But here is the thing. I believe in God, maker of Heaven and Earth, of all things seen and unseen. God would not create a fragile system, knowing our propensity to screw things up. The global warming nutcases, and the green wackos on the other hand believe in the earth god, Gaia. Their religion has much in common with that of the ancient Egyptians. In ancient Egypt, the Pharaoh had to wake up before breakfast each day and preform a ritual which would "cause" the sun to rise. If he did not perform this ritual, the sun would not rise, and all would be lost. As we know today, the sun rises whether anyone calls it forth or not. Many other ancient religions had various forms of fertility rites, usually involving ritualized sex, because otherwise the crops would not grow. As we know now, plants will grow anyway.

Think about this, which type of God would you rather worship: a loving God who creates a universe where things happen whether or not the fickle people in charge do something or not, or one where your very existence is dependant on the likes of Al Gore?

Now, for those who say that my attitude means I don't have a responsibility toward the earth and its creatures, I say not so. I, and everyone else, have a responsibility to maintain our environment to the best of our ability, considering our economic wherewithall. We have an obligation not to pollute our waters, or our air. When we mine valuable substances from the earth, we have an obligation to leave the site substantially as we found it. We do not have an obligation to not mine at all. To deliberately not use resources which we have been provided, and which could improve the lives of our fellow man is also a sin. When we burn fossil fuels, including coal, we have an obligation to clean up the soot before it goes into the air. But when we do not utilize resources that have been provided to us and for which we have the knowledge, we also sin. So, for instance, we should be making better use of nuclear power, and where appropriate, wind power. But a realistic reckoning will suggest that wind power is very limited on its own. We have an obligation to utilize animals for food, but not to mistreat them. And we must always understand that the rights granted to man have been granted because we alone of all creatures have a moral sense. It would be wrong to hold a dog guilty of murder, for instance, because the dog was just following instinct. Similarly, we can not allow dogs to run free in human society.

The above paragraph is provided for the obtuse. Everyone else realizes the truth of what I am saying here.

The PUMA-Our Future?

How about a little comic relief. Well, a little more comic relief, since I did have a funny Saturday too. Tim Slagle mocks the newest GM concept vehicle in The Newest Needless Car. The vehicle, called a PUMA, is a street legal Segway. Some quotes to whet your appetite:

With the assistance of GM, Segway did something everyone thought was
absolutely impossible: They made the Segway even DORKIER.

Or this:

Which was the motivation behind the PUMA: a street-legal version of a Segway. It is being touted as a solution to gridlock, pollution, Iraq, the energy crisis, and just about everything else the Left rails about; a glimpse into the future of transportation.

Great. A new car that is capable of reaching the blinding speed of 35 MPH… for an hour, before you have to plug it in. (It is specifically intended for urban transport, since a cross-country trip would be quicker in a covered wagon.) No trunk or radio, no heat or air conditioning, and when it rains, you get wet. Boy, I can't wait for the future!

Or this:

How many laws have already been passed against cool? Helmet laws, seat belt laws, and smoking bans have limited Americans’ choice to look cool. (How come "choice" doesn't extend beyond the uterus?) The same wallflowers that ran for student council are now in charge of this nation; the ones that told the teachers that the punch was spiked are frantically trying to legislate the fun out of everything American.

It is just another phase in the Dorkification of America. Americans have always had a swagger that set them apart from other citizens of the world, and the ultimate revenge of the nerds would be to turn these United States into Europe. Dorky kids look normal in Europe, where their pale complexions, skinny slumping postures, and bad teeth fit in quite well.

Like any good comedian, he conjures up a more than just the topic he is ostensibly discussing, and he is none to PC while doing it. Go and read the whole thing.

On a more serious note, GM and Segway were clearly working on this concept before Obama fired the CEO of GM (which he had no right to do) and put another CEO in his place (again, where's the Constitutional authority for this?). But having done that, and guaranteed GM warranties, I think Obama now "owns" GM, and all its stupidities. Is "The One" prepared to look as pedestrian as a Chevy?

Greenpeace Threatens Polar Bears

Here is a rich little tidbit. Apparently, a NASA report, blogged about here by Notoriously Conservative claims that the poles are melting and threatening the poor polar bears because of pollution controls put in place in the 1970s. So it is the Environmentalists to blame. Shame on them! The solution apparently is not a cap and trade tax on carbon emissions, but a 100% tax on Environmentalists.

Read the Notoriously Conservative post to get the details.

Cap and Trade's Regressive Tax

Yesterday, I wrote about the $2 Trillion cap and trade proposal by the Obama administration. One of the things I mentioned was that cap and trade represented a regressive tax. Today's article by Jillian Bandes, by the same title as the post, reports on a Tax Foundation report that tells us just how regressive such a tax would be.

Greenpeace claims benefits which would offset the tax, but their first claim, that global warming would be stopped, is fictional. Their claim of "green jobs" also requires subsidies from still other taxes in order to work. The whole thing reminds me of children happily making mud pies. They show the mud pies to Mom, who declares them gorgeous, but in reality no one is going to eat them.

Bleak Winter Leads to Bleak Spring

Also from Townhall.com is this article by Emmett Tyrrell, entitled "The Bleak Winter's Behind Us, but What's Ahead." Tyrrell brings to our attention that The One's cap and trade proposal would cost yet another $2 Trillion dollars (aren't you growing tired of the huge expense of all these programs?) This is despite the utter failure to prove a man made component to the global warming scam, or the fact that cap and trade has spectacularly failed to bring about a lowering of CO2 emissions in Europe. What it would do is transfer huge amounts of wealth from the private sector to the public. It would give those 535 incompetents in Congress yet more say in our energy industries. It would jack up the cost of nearly everything you purchase, without adding value. I call that a tax, and a highly regressive one at that.

Cap and trade is a bad idea, to solve a non-existent problem which is based on unproven theories. It should be stopped in its tracks.

Scientific Resources That Refute Global Warming

Contrary to the assertion by Al Gore that the 'science is settled,' there are a
wealth of voices within the scientific community that not only question the
global warming hypothesis but outright reject it. And they provide the hard
science to prove that the theory is wrong..

I used to be heavily involved in the "global warming" scam. It never made sense to me that so little CO2 could cause so much calamity. I always asked, and never got an answer what caused the previous warmings, when man supposedly was not around? And I always suspected that at the center of the mess was a leftist trying to cripple our economy. Now I know. Thanks, Weshman.
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