Filed under: Bureaucracy, Democrat Corruption, Domestic Policy, Environment, Free Markets, Freedom, Global Warming, Junk Science, Law, News of the Weird, Politics, Progressivism, Regulation | Tags: Bovine Flatulence, California, Governor Moonbeam
You have probably learned by now that the great state of California has determined to advance it’s fight against global warming by a serious effort to reduce emissions from bovine flatulence. Yes, cow gas.
Cattle and other farm animals are major sources of methane, a greenhouse gas many times more potent than carbon dioxide as a heat-trapping gas. Methane is released when they belch, pass gas and make manure.
“If we can reduce emissions of methane, we can really help to slow global warming,” said Ryan McCarthy, a science adviser for the California Air Resources Board, which is drawing up rules to implement the new law.
Livestock are responsible for 14.5 percent of human-induced greenhouse gas emissions, with beef and dairy production accounting for the bulk of it, according to a 2013 United Nations report.
California is a the nation’s largest dairy farming state, and dairy farmers are not taking this lying down. This will drive up costs when farms have struggled for five years with drought, low milk prices and rising labor costs. The state has set up $50 million to help dairies set up methane digesters which capture the methane from manure in large storage tanks and convert the gas into electricity. Farmers, who probably understand the cost analysis better than state bureaucrats, say this is not nearly enough to equip the state’s roughly 1,500 dairies. More dairy farmers will move out of the state, following other businesses that are leaving California in droves for states where they are better treated.
The difference this will make with climate issues, probably not measurable, but hope is eternal. Governor Brown’s high speed rail doesn’t seem to be going anywhere at enormous cost. The giant Ivanpah solar project has been a flop. In the wake of the election, some Californians demanded that California secede from the Union, apparently unaware of the results of the last time States decided to secede. That demand led to suggestions that California rejoin Mexico, and good riddance, but Californians didn’t like that either. The “Golden” State continues in its drive to make itself unpopular.
Filed under: Bureaucracy, Capitalism, Communism, Crime, Democrat Corruption, Economy, Freedom, History, National Security, News, Progressivism, The United States | Tags: Communism Fails Again, Obama's Statement, The Death of Castro
President Obama’s statement on the passing of Fidel Castro was much more carefully phrased than that of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. In fact, it is a marvelous example of an attempt to dot every i and cross every t and offend no one, no one at all.
At this time of Fidel Castro’s passing, we extend a hand of friendship to the Cuban people. We know that this moment fills Cubans – in Cuba and in the United States – with powerful emotions, recalling the countless ways in which Fidel Castro altered the course of individual lives, families, and of the Cuban nation. History will record and judge the enormous impact of this singular figure on the people and world around him. …
(Do read the whole thing. It’s quite precious. Makes me want to throw up).
At The Wall Street Journal, Mary Anastasia O’Grady counts Castro’s victims, and reviews “The Secret Life of Fidel Castro” a biography by Juan Renaldo Sanchez who was for 17 years a part of the team of elite Cuban security specialists charged with protecting Castro’s life and privacy. It’s worth remembering that Castro begged the Russians to nuke the U.S., and Russian missiles were installed in Cuba.
At The American Interest, Walter Russell Mead explains that “A Dictator Dies a Failure.”
Fidel Castro wanted an independent path for Cuba. He leaves a shattered society and a desperately poor country behind him, less able to shape its destiny than it was in 1959.
At City Journal. Michael Totten had a lovely essay on “The Last Communist City: A visit to the dystopian Havana that tourists never see. ”
I’ve always wanted to visit Cuba—not because I’m nostalgic for a botched utopian fantasy but because I wanted to experience Communism firsthand. When I finally got my chance several months ago, I was startled to discover how much the Cuban reality lines up with Blomkamp’s dystopia. In Cuba, as in Elysium, a small group of economic and political elites live in a rarefied world high above the impoverished masses. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, authors of The Communist Manifesto, would be appalled by the misery endured by Cuba’s ordinary citizens and shocked by the relatively luxurious lifestyles of those who keep the poor down by force. (For some reason, I was unable to link to the essay from 2014, You can find it on Google)
And the great political cartoonist Michael Ramirez captured the moment: (click to enlarge)
Filed under: Capitalism, Democrat Corruption, Domestic Policy, Economy, Election 2016, Politics, Progressivism, Taxes, Unemployment | Tags: A Little Humor, Election 2016, Riots and Mob Behavior
Of the 112 “protesters” arrested in Portland riots, 69 of them could not be found to have turned in a ballot, nor were registered to vote in Oregon. Interesting details largely unmentioned by the media.
Some Leftist remarked “Why can’t we run someone who’s beloved?”
Filed under: Bureaucracy, Democrat Corruption, Domestic Policy, Education, Freedom, Heartwarming, Law, Media Bias, Politics, Regulation | Tags: Embarrassing!, If You Have a Question Just Ask, Voter Fraud
Last month, President Obama was in Florida for a partisan fundraiser, described as part stump speech, part farewell-tour stop.And he took the occasion to knock any efforts by Republicans to “ensure election integrity one last time.”
The president just doesn’t think there is such a thing as election fraud. As he informed the assembled Floridians, “You are much likelier to get struck by lightning than to have somebody next to you commit voter fraud.”
…But we know one thing for sure. The Left loves this old lightning-strike chestnut.It’s a claim that was debunked more than four years ago, yet progressives keep trotting it out anyway. So it’s time to debunk it again, by turning to the National Weather Service and the Heritage Foundation’s voter-fraud database. which contains hundreds of cases of election fraud, all of which have been proven in courts of law and resulted in criminal convictions or overturned elections.
The very partisan Mainstream Media should be ashamed of themselves.
Filed under: Bureaucracy, Cool Site of the Day, Crime, Democrat Corruption, Election 2016, National Security, Politics, Progressivism, The United States | Tags: A Former CIA Agent Speaks, The Entire Notion is "Insane", Very Wrong and Very Serious
In spite of all the conversation and millions of words that have embroidered the campaign of Hillary Clinton for the Presidency of the United States, I’m not at all sure that people understand just what the email scandal is all about. Charles Faddis, a former CIA operations officer with 20 years of experience in intelligence operations took to The Hill to explain just why Hillary Clinton’s emails are important and why her use of a private email server is a big deal. For it is a very big deal indeed. Mr. Faddis explains:
I have worked in national security my entire life. Most of that has been in the intelligence community surrounded by classified information. For twenty years, I worked undercover in the Central Intelligence Agency, recruiting sources, producing intelligence and running operations. I have a pretty concrete understanding of how classified information is handled and how government communications systems work.
Nobody uses a private email server for official business.
Period. Full stop.
The entire notion is, to borrow a phrase from a Clinton campaign official, “insane.” That anyone would presume to be allowed to do so is mind-boggling. That government officials allowed Hillary Clinton to do so is nauseating.
Classified and unclassified information do not mix. They don’t travel in the same streams through the same pipes. They move in clearly well defined channels so that never the twain shall meet. Mixing them together is unheard of and a major criminal offense.
If you end up with classified information in an unclassified channel, you have done something very wrong and very serious.
Accidentally removing a single classified message from controlled spaces, without any evidence of intent or exposure to hostile forces, can get you fired and cost you your clearance. Repeated instances will land you in prison.
The whole thing is available here: Everyone, depending on their affiliations tries to portray the issue as simply nasty political accusations with no merit whatsoever, or as some Trump crowds scream “Lock her up, Lock her up!” It is not the usual case of mild government corruption, everybody does it sort of thing. The Clintons may have believed that everybody does it, but they are wrong. On the other hand, there are scandals attached to far too many government agencies, fortunately none of the others deal so directly with national security.