Horrifying! TOTUS has been there for this guy at some of his worse moments, and yet he has hung in there. Trip on a syllable, no problem. TOTUS kept rolling. Stumble on an market economy point you never quite understood, TOTUS did. Now Matthews wants him gone. Oh the humanity. [Read more...]
Connecticut should not make pistol permit information available to public
Connecticut state law does not allow pistol permit records to be available to the public. Many states do allow this information to be released, and some media outlets – in a drive to increase page views – have published the full databases including private information simply because it’s “public record.”
Sharpton: “This is our day and we ain’t giving it away”
I think this is sad. Not sure what to say, but Rev. Al Sharpton stood on a stage Saturday and certainly did nothing to improve the political or racial discussion in the United States.
Florida’s Governor Crist: Thoroughly confused about Obamacare
We learned in a news interview yesterday that Florida’s Governor, Charlie Crist would have voted for Obamacare, that is, before he voted against Obamacare, which was, of course before he voted for Obamacare.
Those of you unfamiliar with the Florida political landscape should know that our “Republican” governor really, really wants to be its next Senator. When Senator Mel Martinez (R. Fl.) resigned earlier this year, Governor Crist was able to appoint his successor. He appointed George LeMieux (or, as many Florida news reports called him, George LeWho?) to fill the vacant seat. Senator LeMieux was a close personal friend of Crist, and had every intention of stepping down when Martinez’s term expired at the end of this year, thus, or so thought Charlie, paving the way for Crist to be swept into office.
Problems arose for Crist when Marco Rubio entered the race for the Republican nomination. As time went on, it became clearer and clearer that it would be Rubio, not Crist who would win the nomination. So, Crist did what any loyal upstanding politician would do…he decided to run for the Senate seat as an Independent.
Yesterday, in an interview, Crist was asked how he would have voted on Obamacare. His answer…”I would have voted for it“. You can see the entire interview at this link. (Sorry about the political ad before you get to the interview.)
Within hours, Marco Rubio had this to say:
In less than 30 days, Crist has gone from voting against the bill to voting for it to now being against it again.
And, Kendrick Meek, the Democratic nominee for Senate, had this to say:
Obviously, the governor is having a crisis of memory.
Not to be outdone, here is what Crist’s campaign office released:
Apparently, based on an interview this afternoon, there may be some confusion regarding my position on health care,” Crist said. “If I misspoke, I want to be abundantly clear: the health care bill was too big, too expensive, and expanded the role of government far too much. Had I been in the United States Senate at the time, I would have voted against the bill because of unacceptable provisions like the cuts to the Medicare Advantage program.
Got that?
Crist for Senator…now there’s a guy you can count on to remain steadfast in his political beliefs, and who will keep his campaign promises…if he remembers them, and if it is convenient to do so.
Lie to New Jersey Gov. Christie … you goin’ down, down, down
New Jersey Education Commissioner Bret Schundler has been relieved of his duties. Gov. Chris Christie (R-N.J.) made it a point to note Schundler provided the correct budget figures at a “Race to the Top” presentation in Washington D.C. Did anyone have a camera focused on Schundler when Christie made that claim?
Wind power generation may lead to higher CO2 emissions
Much was written here this past weekend about solar power. So, I thought it only fair to give “equal time” to wind power. It seems that recent studies are showing that any reduction in carbon emissions from the use of wind power to generate electricity is, nominal at best.
Before you dismiss this statement as “right wing” propaganda, please read on. It will soon make perfect sense.
Two laws of nature are at play here which cannot be altered by either good intentions, or government edict. First, wind does not blow 24 hours a day, 365 days of the year. And second, to produce power efficiently, traditional coal or gas powered generators are designed to run continuously. As to the second, think of it this way.
An automobile that operates at a constant speed—say 55 miles per hour–will have better fuel efficiency, and emit less pollution per mile traveled, than one that is stuck in stop-and-go traffic.
Because we expect that the lights will actually go on when we turn on the light switch, electricity generators must make sure that power is always available. This leaves the electricity generator who relies on wind power to supplement its power supply with two options. It can either “power down” it’s, let’s say coal fired plant, when it is receiving a great deal of wind powered electricity, and then “power up” the plant when the wind stops. Or, it can leave the coal powered plant running continuously.
The former option (rush hour traffic) results in more CO2 emissions than running the generators continuously, but the latter option doesn’t reduce CO2 emissions from those levels that existed before the wind “supplement”.
Perhaps it comes down to what Kevin Forbes, the director of the Center for the Study of Energy and Environmental Stewardship at Catholic University, [said] ‘Wind energy gives people a nice warm fuzzy feeling, that we’re taking action on climate change…the reality is that it’s not doing much of anything.’
No one disagrees with the concept of clean energy. It is something we should foster. But, as my engineer friend said today, the issue is dependability and predictability. In other words, we expect the lights to go on when we push the “on” switch.
And, government can’t legislate dependability and predictability, or, suspend the laws of nature for that matter, no matter how hard it tries.
Federal judge blocks Obama’s stem cell research policy
On Monday, Federal District Court Judge Royce Lamberth of the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., granted a preliminary injunction barring the use of federal money for stem cell research. The ban only applies to the use of federal funds for this research. Private funds can still be used.
What is interesting here is that the court did not rule on the wisdom, or lack thereof, of spending federal money on this type of medical research.
As background, in 2001 then President Bush allowed the use of federal funds for stem cell research in certain limited areas, to wit: already established stem cell lines. Then, in 2009, as one of his first official acts, President Obama greatly expanded upon Bush’s policy by allowing new stem cell lines to be used.
The new guidelines do not allow the use of federal dollars to create the stem cells but do allow researchers to work with them if they are made by another lab.
Obama’s policy thus allowed private labs with no federal funding to create stem cells, and once created, other labs using federal funds could use those cells for research.
Here’s the problem. When stem cells are “created” an embryo is destroyed no matter who creates the stem cells. And,
[k]ey to the case is the so-called Dickey-Wicker Amendment, which Congress adds to budget legislation every year [and which president's sign every year]. It bans the use of federal funds to destroy human embryos.
The court reasoned that embryonic stem cell research “necessarily depends on the destruction of a human embryo”, and thus, the Dickey-Wicker Amendment applied and precluded the use of federal funds for any such research.
What is notable here is that this ruling confirms the proposition that a president cannot, by executive order or otherwise, overturn a law validly passed by Congress. This is the beauty of our system of checks and balances. Presidential fiats of any sort cannot be used to circumvent federal laws enacted by congress and signed into law by presidents.
Mob rule and the “Ground Zero Mosque”: Lefties show the love
I post this only because those who opposed the mosque (yes mosque, not community center) at Ground Zero have been described by the main stream media as “haters”, “bigots”, “Islamophobes” and yes, even raaaaaaaacists. And yet somehow these incidents always fall off the radar screen of the main stream media or dismissed as the “radical fringe”. Lots of fringe on this movement. [Read more...]
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