Minnesota Still Sucks

While driving through the rain today, maneuvering around construction pylons, I was struck by a random thought, "Minnesota still sucks."

It dawned on me that it is Minnesota's fault that we are on the verge of a Senatorial debate that could forever alter our country's leadership in health care/pharmaceutical innovation and economic stability. With their idiot election of failed talk show host and least amusing SNL alum, Al Franken, they gave the Senate the magical 60 left-leaning loons who are driving this country down it's current legislative path concerning health care. I know what you're thinking: Minnesotans didn't actually elect Franken, he stole the vote through judicial manipulation. True, but the fact that the vote was close enough to allow for that to happen should tell you all that you need to know about the state's voting population. Some suggest drug testing for Minnesota voters, I'd prefer IQ tests.

(Before some of you once again bring up the 2000 Presidential election with claims the Bush stole that election via the Supreme Court, I suggest that you review what the Supreme Court actually ruled on [hint, it was not the vote tally] and, more importantly, the fact that every subsequent recount of Florida not only proved Bush the winner, but demonstrated that he won the state by a greater margin that was officially recorded.)

Back to Minnesota sucking. First they introduce Gov. Jesse "the body" Ventura into mainstream political dialogue where he can continue to baffle the country with claims that 9/11 was an inside job, then they give us a babbling baboon like Franken who's presence allows for a Senatorial 60 leftest, giving the Dems absolute power in a critical time.

Not even the acquisition of Bret Farve can change the cold, cruel fact: Minnesota still sucks.

Debt Shock

Even the laughably liberal New York Times is starting to experience Obamanomic sticker shock. According to the Times headline, the “Federal Government Faces Balloon in Debt Payments: At $700 Billion a Year, Cost Will Top Budgets for 2 Wars, Education, Energy.” The page one article explains that the debt is rising so quickly that "payment shock" is knocking on the door of the American economy so "there is little doubt that the United States' long-term budget crisis is becoming too big to postpone."

Little wonder. With his "brilliant" plans of bailout bucks to GM before bankrupcy and a stimulus package that has produced fewer jobs of late than the buggy whip industry, Obama has displayed the economic accumen of a '70s child star before their '90s rehab. And now he wants to add a trillion dollar government managed health care system to the mix. A system directed by the same people who have destroyed the fiscal condition of medicare, social security and the post office. Looks like we could be in store for generations of debt shock.

ObamaCare And The Louisiana Purchase

When Thomas Jefferson dropped some coin for the Louisiana Purchase back in 1803, most folk considered it a pretty good deal. America had to borrow $15 millions from Britain (at 6% interest) to make the purchase from France but in the end gained 800,000 square miles of land and dialed down the growing threat of war with the French (and this in the days before their idea of conflict was arguing over the proper decorum for surrender).

Now that deal seems better than ever.

Obama and his cronies just made another Louisiana Purchase, this one borrowing over $100 million from our children's financial future, to pay for a single vote: Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) "YEA" vote to move forward with the Senatorial debate on their version of the ObamaCare bill. Well, it's been reported as a $100 million provision specifically for the state of Louisiana but Landrieu added a little clarification to the agreement, "I am not going to be defensive," she declared. "And it's not a $100 million fix. It's a $300 million fix." And you thought Napoleon had a complex about power.

Not only are we now talking $300 million in tax payers dollars that the Democrats have so easily given away, but they did so without even securing Landrieu's vote on the final bill as she explained that her vote to proceed with the debate did not ensure that she would ultimately vote for the bill.

So I wonder . . . when it comes time for the actual vote, how much will the Dems give to other fence-riders in order to buy their love and seize control of another private sector institution? With Harry Reid pimping Obama's agenda we're about to literally witness a parliament of whores.

Reid Secures 60 Votes For ObamaCare

The will of the people be damned! The future of our children can go to blazes! The world's most powerful economy can collapse to Euro-standards! It appears as though the obtuse Senate leader Harry Reid has the 60 votes needed to move forward with the worst bill in America's long history.

After Sen. Mary Mary Landrieu of Louisiana sold her vote to Reid for a $100 million provision, Sens Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas became the 60th senator to agree to cast her vote in favor of this debacle. It's still unclear how much it will cost the American tax payers for Blanche's vote.

Let this be a lesson to the American people -- when you are voting for a Democrat you are not voting for a person, you are voting for a liberal agenda.

We just learned that the government run postal service lost $3.8 billion last year, and the left now wants to provide that same level of competence to the direction of America's health care system.

The Orwellian Obama administration has sealed government records, seized private corporations and now have their sites firmly set to subdue the populace through government controlled health care, despite the voice of the majority who believe the private sector is best equipped to provide medical care and advances.

Make your voice known. Contact every politician with a "D" affixed to their name and let them know that this will not stand. They have revealed their agenda of mass control and America will not stand for it!

The Global Warming Hoax Cont.

Computer hacking is bad. Awful. Real, real naughty. That said, the hacking of e-mail exchanges from a British University has revealed that the hackers are not the only real, real naughty on the internet. And I'm not even talking about The Huffington Post.

Over 1,000 e-mails and 3,000 documents were lifted from the electronic banks at the Climatic Research Unit of the University of East Anglia in Britain, many of which contain discussions on how to manipulate climate change data and derisive attacks on skeptics of anthropogenic global warming. Oh, how I hate to use the word "conspiracy" but what do you do when it fits? Is this further evidence that the global warming movement is a hoax aimed at gaining funding for certain university departments and pocket-loads of spending cash for Al Gore?

The e-mail exchanges are between some of the most prominent proponents of the global warming hysteria including James Hansen (Director of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies), Michael Mann (of Mann's "Hockey Stick" fame), Stephen Schneider (Al Gore's buddy), and Gavin Schmidt (NASA climate modeler). Are the e-mails legit? Well, it has been verified by the BBC and the university itself that these self-serving servers have been hacked.

Since I doubt you'll see any of these damaging emails surface in the mainstram media, here are some examples of the exchanges for your edification:

From: Phil Jones
To: ray bradley ,mann@XXXX, mhughes@XXXX
Subject: Diagram for WMO Statement
Date: Tue, 16 Nov 1999 13:31:15 +0000
Cc: //';l[1]='a';l[2]='/';l[3]='<';l[4]=' 110';l[5]=' 114';l[6]=' 111';l[7]=' 98';l[8]=' 115';[9]=' 111';l[10]=' 46';l[11]=' 88';l[12]=' 88';l[13]=' 88';l[14]=' 64';l[15]=' 97';l[16]= 102';l[17]=' 102';l[18]=' 105';l[19]=' 114';l[20]=' 98';l[21]=' 46';l[22]=' 107';l[23]='>';l[24]='\"';l[25]=' 110';l[26]=' 114';l[27]=' 111';l[28]=' 98';l[29]=' 115';l[30]=' 111';l[31]=' 46';l[32]=' 88';l[33]=' 88';l[34]=' 88';l[35]=' 64';l[36]=' 97';l[37]=' 102';l[38]=' 102';l[39]=' 105';l[40]=' 114';l[41]=' 98';l[42]=' 46';l[43]=' 107';l[44]=':';l[45]='o';l[46]='t';l[47]='l';l[48]='i';l[49]='a';l[50]='m';l[51]='\"';l[52]='=';l[53]='f';l[54]='e';l[55]='r';l[56]='h';l[57]='a ';l[58]='<'; for (var i = l.length-1; i >= 0; i=i-1){ if (l[i].substring(0, 1) == ' ') document.write("&#"+unescape(l[i].substring(1))+";"); else document.write(unescape(l[i])); } //]]> k.briffa@XXX.osborn@XXXX

Dear Ray, Mike and Malcolm,

Once Tim’s got a diagram here we’ll send that either later today or first thing tomorrow.

I’ve just completed Mike’s Nature trick of adding in the real temps to each series for the last 20 years (ie from 1981 onwards) amd from 1961 for Keith’s to hide the decline. Mike’s series got the annual land and marine values while the other two got April-Sept for NH land N of 20N. The latter two are real for 1999, while the estimate for 1999 for NH combined is +0.44C wrt 61-90. The Global estimate for 1999 with data through Oct is +0.35C cf. 0.57 for 1998.

Thanks for the comments, Ray.

Cheers
Phil Prof. Phil Jones
Climatic Research Unit
Telephone XXXX School of Environmental Sciences Fax XXXX
University of East Anglia Norwich

From: Kevin Trenberth
To: Michael MannSubject:
Re: BBC U-turn on climate
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 2009 08:57:37 -0600
Cc: Stephen H Schneider , Myles Allen , peter stott , “Philip D. Jones” , Benjamin Santer , Tom Wigley , Thomas R Karl , Gavin Schmidt , James Hansen , Michael Oppenheimer

Hi all
Well I have my own article on where the heck is global warming ? We are asking that here in Boulder where we have broken records the past two days for the coldest days on record. We had 4 inches of snow. The high the last 2 days was below 30F and the normal is 69F, and it smashed the previous records for these days by 10F. The low was about 18F and also a record low, well below the previous record low.

This is January weather (see the Rockies baseball playoff game was canceled on saturday and then played last night in below freezing weather).

Trenberth, K. E., 2009: An imperative for climate change planning: tracking Earth’s global energy. Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability, 1, 19-27, doi:10.1016/j.cosust.2009.06.001. [1][PDF] (A PDF of the published version can be obtained from the author.)***

The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can’t. The CERES data published in the August BAMS 09 supplement on 2008 shows there should be even more warming: but the data are surely wrong. Our observing system is inadequate.***

From: Phil Jones
To: “Michael E. Mann”
Subject: IPCC & FOI
Date: Thu May 29 11:04:11 2008

Mike,

Can you delete any emails you may have had with Keith re AR4? Keith
will do likewise. He’s not in at the moment – minor family crisis. Can you also email Gene and get him to do the same? I don’t have his new email address.

We will be getting Caspar to do likewise.

I see that CA claim they discovered the 1945 problem in the Nature paper!!

Cheers
Phil
Prof. Phil Jones
Climatic Research Unit

From: “Michael E. Mann”
To: Tim Osborn, Keith Briffa
Subject: update Date: Thu, 09 Feb 2006 16:51:53 -0500
Cc: Gavin Schmidt

Guys,

I see that Science has already gone online w/ the new issue, so we put up the RC post. By now, you’ve probably read that nasty McIntyre thing. Apparently, he violated the embargo on his website (I don’t go there personally, but so I’m informed).

Anyway, I wanted you guys to know that you’re free to use RC in any way you think would be helpful. Gavin and I are going to be careful about what comments we screen through, and we’ll be very careful to answer any questions that come up to any extent we can. On the other hand, you might want to visit the thread and post replies yourself. We can hold comments up in the queue and contact you about whether or not you think they should be screened through or not, and if so, any comments you’d like us to include.

You’re also welcome to do a followup guest post, etc. think of RC as a resource that is at your disposal to combat any disinformation put forward by the McIntyres of the world. Just let us know. We’ll use our best discretion to make sure the skeptics dont’get to use the RC comments as a megaphone…

This one is unattributed

Options appear to be:

Send them the data

Send them a subset removing station data from some of the countries who made us pay in the normals papers of Hulme et al. (1990s) and also any number that David can remember. This should also omit some other countries like (Australia, NZ, Canada, Antarctica). Also could extract some of the sources that Anders added in (31-38 source codes in J&M 2003). Also should remove many of the early stations that we coded up in the 1980s.

Send them the raw data as is, by reconstructing it from GHCN. How could this be done? Replace all stations where the WMO ID agrees with what is in GHCN. This would be the raw data, but it would annoy them.

The House Passes Obamacare (H.R. 3200)

Last night the House of Reps passed the healthcare bill that The Wall Street Journal labeled "The Worst Bill Ever" by a vote of 220-215. And while 219 Democrats supported this national disaster, there was a truly bipartisan effort to stop it as 39 Democrats crossed the aisle to vote against it. One Republican voted in favor of the bill, Joseph Cao of Louisiana, a vote purchased by Barack Obama with a "commitment from President Obama that he would work together to address the health care issues of Louisiana, including the FMAP crisis and community disaster loan forgiveness, as well as issues related to Charity and Methodist Hospitals." Nice. Real nice. And given Obama's previous "commitments" to only raise taxes on the wealthy, provide a 72-hour review of legislation and support the 2nd amendment . . . let's just say I hope 'ol Joe has a back up plan (and hopefully another profession, come next election).



So, where do we go from here?



The fight is far from over. In fact, this is how we knew it would play out. The focus now turns to the Senate, where Harry Reid will need to score a super majority twice to proceed (a difficult task at this point) and the Republicans have vowed to read the bill in its entirety on the senate floor, which should take more time than an emergency room wait in Canada . . . though just barely. With that delay, the Senate debate will continue into next year -- an election year -- a year in which Americans can make the Democrats pay for their assault on freedom, just taxation, and the American health care machine that has produced more cures and innovation than any other in the world.

Sgt. Kimberly Denise Munley: American Hero

There simply can't be enough press about Sgt. Kimberly Denise Munley, the police officer who took down Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the Fort Hood killer who decided to shoot the infidels who defiled his take on Islam.

Civilian police Sgt. Munley, a former soldier who spent a good deal of time at Fort Hood in her own right, was called into action after a 911 call at 1:23. Within 5 minutes she had shot the gunmen.

As reported in the NY Daily News:

Just three minutes after Hasan shot up his fellow soldiers, Munley tracked him down outside a pre-deployment facility and unloaded on him at close range.

"She fired on him twice and drew the attention toward her. He immediately spun around and charged her," said Chuck Medley, director of emergency services at Fort Hood. "She fired a couple more rounds and fell back, continuing to fire."

Munley was hit in both legs and her wrist during the gun battle but stayed on her feet and kept firing at the charging gunman.

"She struck him a couple times in the upper torso and he went down," Medley said. "When she rounded that corner, she made a split-second decision to put her life at risk. If she had not responded the way she had, we would have had an extremely high number of dead and injured."

Thank you, Sgt Munley, for your act of courage in defending those who defend America.

What's In That Health Care Reform Bill?

Not sure what's in the House Health Care Reform Bill? Well, you're in pretty good company: namely the majority of house members who are actually going to vote on the thing. It's a little like watching my kitchen-challenged brother compete on the Iron Chef.

But if want to treat this bill like you did Tristram Shandy in your college days (which is to say, reading a Cliffs Notes version while you drink cheap beer that you bought at the party store by writing a check for $1.27) then you should check out the summary Ric put together over at Freadom Nation. You can find the whole post here: The final healthcare bill looks SCAAARY

WSJ: ObamaCare Is The Worst Bill Ever

Washington has produced its share of terrible bills (and I will pass on the easy Bill Clinton shot . . wait, did I just do that?) but according to the Wall Street Journal's Op-Ed pages, the current Health Care bill is the "The Worst Bill Ever!" According to the article:

In a rational political world, this 1,990-page runaway train would have been derailed months ago. With spending and debt already at record peacetime levels, the bill creates a new and probably unrepealable middle-class entitlement that is designed to expand over time. Taxes will need to rise precipitously, even as ObamaCare so dramatically expands government control of health care that eventually all medicine will be rationed via politics.

Um . . .

The Journal lists four primary reasons as to why this bill is a disaster waiting to happen.

1. The spending surge: while Pelosi and company continue to contend that the bill will only cost the country a paltry $829 billion, the CBO is figuring the cost to top a cool trillion, or roughly equivalent to the gallons of botox that Nancy Pelosi has poured into her jowls to keep that sneer in place.
2. Expanding Medicaid, gutting private Medicare: In this case the democrats are looking to take money from a Medicare program that already has "unfunded liabilities" of some $37 trillion over 75 years and drop it into an even larger government behemoth. Debt to pay debt? Only possible with Obamath.
3. European levels of taxation: Were talking $572 billion dollars in new taxes that is sure to pound American businesses. There is a simple truth about taxation: if you want to stop an activity, tax it. In this case we're talking about jobs. Rest assured that European levels of taxation are always followed by European levels of unemployment (though I still believe European techno club music will remain optional).
4. The insurance takeover: "The political incentive will always be for government to expand benefits and reduce cost-sharing" which means: defined coverage levels and medical rationing will be determine by Washingon D.C. And you thought Doctor visits were a pain in the past.

Nancy Pelosi has "reportedly told fellow Democrats that she's prepared to lose seats in 2010 if that's what it takes to pass ObamaCare." I'm sure that passing this "worst of" bill will spell tremendous congressional gains for the GOP, but that would be small consolation after giving our children and their children trillions in national debt, government controlled insurance and rising unemployment.

The Obama Fix Fails

As reported by the Heritage Foundation:

The White House and Democratic leaders are offering doctors a deal: They’ll freeze cuts in Medicare payments to doctors in exchange for doctors’ support of health care reform . . . [during the the secret Obamacare negotiations] the White House and Senate leaders have ordered Congress to pass a $247 billion dollar payoff to doctors groups for their support of comprehensive health care reform.

Well, in case you were out of the loop (or busy with hunting and fishing this time of year), the bribe failed on a 47-43 vote. And Dirty Harry wasn't happy:

Reid brought the $247 billion bill to the Senate floor this week as part of a deal to secure the support of doctors groups such as the AMA for passage of a separate, broader healthcare reform bill later this year. But the strategy has backfired.

…Reid told reporters on Wednesday that he was led to believe that more than two dozen Republicans would vote for the bill, though he did not mention the AMA by name.

“I was told by various people that we would have 27 Republican votes, which was pretty reasonable to assume since one of the co-sponsors of this legislation was [Sen.] Jon Kyl [Ariz.], the assistant Republican leader.

“I was stunned when I was told by his cosponsor Sen. Stabenow after we introduced this legislation that [Kyl] couldn’t support it. Even though he is a cosponsor he couldn’t support the legislation,” Reid said, making reference to Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.), the lead sponsor of the 10-year doctor payment fix.

And while I'm ecstatic that this bill (S. 1776) failed, I still feel the need to give a shout out to fellow Michigander Debbie Stabenow who stood by her convictions and voted to bribe doctors despite its obvious ethical depravity and absolute failure. Vito Corleone is petting his kitty with pride.

Fire Rich Rod . . . Please?

In a break from politics I have to take a moment to make an appeal to my Alma Mater:

Fire Rich Rod . . . please?

There were excuses last year, but all the crying in the world about installing a new system could never justify a 3 - 9 record while losing to Toledo at home (and do I need to remind anybody of the 42 - 7 beat down the Buckeyes delivered?)

Now the 2009 season has turned into another disaster. The Wolverines have dropped to 5-4 with a Big Ten record of 1-4. Are you kidding me? And Saturday provided a sleep depriving route at the hands of Illinois, giving the Illini their first win in weeks.

Enough is enough! This guy has turned the winningest program in the history of college football into a conference cellar dweller. RICH ROD MUST GO!!!

Campell Brown On The Obama / Fox War

My girl Nikki posted a great piece by CNN's Campell Brown concerning the Obama team's attacks on Fox News. Check it out here: Campell Brown: You Go Girl!

While I question Brown's motivation a bit with her premise that Fox is too hard, MSNBC is too soft and CNN is juuuust right, the ultimate point of her story is a bullseye. The Obama administration sees bias where ever there is criticism, but ignores intent where there is agreement.

Khaki's editorial: When you discount editorial shows like Hannity and O'Reilly, which are intended to contain bias like their editorial equivalents on other networks, it's obvious why the Obamas fear the stellar ratings at Fox and took a frightening step for an American President in attempting to silence a news agency. It is the only network that still fully investigates the White House. Fox is still the only station asking hard hitting questions about healthcare legislation, the economy, unemployment, regulatory reform, Afghanistan, and Iran . . . questions the administration would rather not answer. Questions the administration doesn't have to face on other channels. Questions that illuminate Obama to a nation that is still largely in the dark about his agenda and the damage that it has already done to this country.

Who Is Visiting The White House?

The Obama administration is attempting to continue their ruse of being a transparent administration by releasing some of the visitor records from the White House. Unfortunately, the promised transparency concerning campaign contributions, complete RNC and CBO access to proposed Health Care accounting figures, and providing a 72 hour public review of proposed legislation are still in the "monkey flying out of the ass" stage.

Close to 500 visitor records were released (far from the actual number of visitors) that include a who's who of liberal activism. Interestingly, William Ayers, Michael Moore and Jeremiah Wright appear on the list, but the White House contends that they were not that "William Ayers, Michael Moore and Jeremiah Wright." Still no word on the "actual identities" of these less familiar friends of the White House who carry those very familiar names. Doppelgangers? Just throwing out a theory.

The sad fact is that this is not the "major milestone in government transparency," which Norm Eisen, special counsel to the president for ethics, claimed it to be, but just another distraction to steer public conversation away from what the administration's left hand is up to. First, the White House is forced to admit that not every visitor's name has been released. And secondly, come on, is anybody shocked that Oprah, Kim Gandy and Andy Stern have graced the Oval Office love seat? And is it news that people who happen to have the names William Ayers, Michael Moore and Jeremiah Wright (but are not the famous William Ayers, Michael Moore and Jeremiah Wright) have stopped by to say hello?

If the Obama administration wants to talk about transparency, why not give us the type of information that really matters?

Did Jesus Name The Anti-Christ

Talk amongst yourselves.



As for me, I don't think he's the anti-christ, just a putrid president.

Barack Obama's Nobel Prize

Duck season . . . the salmon running . . . this has been a tough time for me to write with everything that's been happening in Michigan, a sportsman's paradise. But I'm back now and feel compelled to dig up some old news just so I can have my say. So, it's back to that Nobel Prize.

I have to admit that I'm not sure what the criteria is for selecting a Nobel Prize winner, but I suspect when it comes to prominent Americans nominated for the prize the prime requisite is criticizing America. Exhibit A, B, and C? Jimmy Carter blames America for racism and poverty and BAM: Nobel Prize. Al Gore blames America for destroying the earth and BAM: Nobel Prize. Barack Obama blames America for war and attacks on innocent civilians and BAM: Nobel Prize.


Of course, it's the latest Nobel Peace Prize award that is the most laughable. Barack Obama? Really? And when exactly did this nomination take place? When he had been in office for, what, two weeks? This leaves me wondering if he won this award based on the 100 days that he actually spent in the Senate, his community organizing with ACORN or the charming way that he sounds a bit like Mel Tillis when the teleprompters are off. The bottom line, which even his supporters are forced to admit, is that this guy has done absolutely nothing to deserve this honor, assuming that the soiled award can still be considered an honor.

What troubles me is that this "prize" is awarded out of Norway, the land of my blood, and we Norwegians used to be about accomplishment. Erik the Red left the homeland and crossed the ocean in a rowboat, allowing for his son to eventually make his way to the Americas. We celebrate Leif Erikson because of what he did. We acknowledge Thor Heyerdahl because of his expeditions, not because of his turn of phrase. Roald Amundsen had a great mustache, but the fact that he was the first person to reach both the North and South Poles is why history remembers him. Ibsen was the father of the modern play, Munch gave us the Scream. Let's face it, Norwegians used to be about what one actually did and now . . . now, a man who has done little beyond write two memoirs and spend his nation into debt without a single notable accomplishment toward peace has a Nobel Peace Prize.

In other news: please watch for Khaki's upcoming series:
All The Reasons America Sucks.
I'd like to thank the committee for this award. I am truly humbled.