WUI (Writing under the influence)

"Liberals inhabit their own universe in which reality is optional." -- John Hinderaker, Powerline Blog

"In many more areas, though, the progress that was made under Clinton — almost 23 million new jobs, reductions in poverty, lower crime and higher wages — had been reversed or wiped away entirely in a remarkably short time."

posted by Polish Immigrant  # 6:39 PM 0 comments

A clearly embarrassed Wagenknecht - who was brought up on the works of Marx and Engels, joined the East German communists in 1989, and allegedly mourned the fall of the Berlin Wall - has admitted both to eating the lobster, and erasing the pictures.

posted by Polish Immigrant  # 6:02 PM 0 comments

Energy prices for end-users could rise by some 12% in 2008 as a result of rising coal prices, CO2 emission limits and "green" energy quotas, industry leaders said Tuesday in Katowice.

Coal mines are seeking a roughly 15% price increase for 2008, according to the president of the PKE energy group Jan Kurp, who also leads the energy producer lobby TGPE.

"We need to remember that the cost of fuel is about half of the energy price from producers," Kurp said Tuesday.

"A rise in fuel prices by 15% would mean a rise in energy prices from producers of about 8 to 10% and this is not the only factor that could drive a price increase next year," he said.

Kurp would not give any indication of what sort of price increase for coal might result from current negotiations.

Amongst the top secondary factors driving 2008 energy prices, CO2 emissions could bring costs.

Emission rights for the industry will allow for 17.6 TW of production versus 2007 production at about 22 TW.

Producers have calculated that were all generators to increase production by 3% in 2008 end-user prices would rise by some 2.5 to 3.0%.

Green energy quotas and costs tied to the elimination of long-term energy contracts also made the list of 2008 price drivers.

posted by Polish Immigrant  # 5:37 PM 0 comments

"Pope Benedict XVI has launched a surprise attack on climate change prophets of doom, warning them that any solutions to global warming must be based on firm evidence and not on dubious ideology.

"The leader of more than a billion Roman Catholics suggested that fears over man-made emissions melting the ice caps and causing a wave of unprecedented disasters were nothing more than scare-mongering."

Open Letter to the Secretary-General of the United Nations

Dec. 13, 2007

His Excellency Ban Ki-Moon

Secretary-General, United Nations

New York, N.Y.


Dear Mr. Secretary-General,

Re: UN climate conference taking the World in entirely the wrong direction

It is not possible to stop climate change, a natural phenomenon that has affected humanity through the ages. Geological, archaeological, oral and written histories all attest to the dramatic challenges posed to past societies from unanticipated changes in temperature, precipitation, winds and other climatic variables. We therefore need to equip nations to become resilient to the full range of these natural phenomena by promoting economic growth and wealth generation.

The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has issued increasingly alarming conclusions about the climatic influences of human-produced carbon dioxide (CO2), a non-polluting gas that is essential to plant photosynthesis. While we understand the evidence that has led them to view CO2 emissions as harmful, the IPCC's conclusions are quite inadequate as justification for implementing policies that will markedly diminish future prosperity. In particular, it is not established that it is possible to significantly alter global climate through cuts in human greenhouse gas emissions. On top of which, because attempts to cut emissions will slow development, the current UN approach of CO2 reduction is likely to increase human suffering from future climate change rather than to decrease it.

The IPCC Summaries for Policy Makers are the most widely read IPCC reports amongst politicians and non-scientists and are the basis for most climate change policy formulation. Yet these Summaries are prepared by a relatively small core writing team with the final drafts approved line-by-line

by ­government ­representatives. The great ­majority of IPCC contributors and ­reviewers, and the tens of thousands of other scientists who are qualified to comment on these matters, are not involved in the preparation of these documents. The summaries therefore cannot properly be represented as a consensus view among experts.

Contrary to the impression left by the IPCC Summary reports:

z Recent observations of phenomena such as glacial retreats, sea-level rise and the migration of temperature-sensitive species are not evidence for abnormal climate change, for none of these changes has been shown to lie outside the bounds of known natural variability.

z The average rate of warming of 0.1 to 0. 2 degrees Celsius per decade recorded by satellites during the late 20th century falls within known natural rates of warming and cooling over the last 10,000 years.

z Leading scientists, including some senior IPCC representatives, acknowledge that today's computer models cannot predict climate. Consistent with this, and despite computer projections of temperature rises, there has been no net global warming since 1998. That the current temperature plateau follows a late 20th-century period of warming is consistent with the continuation today of natural multi-decadal or millennial climate cycling.

In stark contrast to the often repeated assertion that the science of climate change is "settled," significant new peer-reviewed research has cast even more doubt on the hypothesis of dangerous human-caused global warming. But because IPCC working groups were generally instructed (see http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/docs/wg1_timetable_2006-08-14.pdf) to consider work published only through May, 2005, these important findings are not included in their reports; i.e., the IPCC assessment reports are already materially outdated.

The UN climate conference in Bali has been planned to take the world along a path of severe CO2 restrictions, ignoring the lessons apparent from the failure of the Kyoto Protocol, the chaotic nature of the European CO2 trading market, and the ineffectiveness of other costly initiatives to curb greenhouse gas emissions. Balanced cost/benefit analyses provide no support for the introduction of global measures to cap and reduce energy consumption for the purpose of restricting CO2 emissions. Furthermore, it is irrational to apply the "precautionary principle" because many scientists recognize that both climatic coolings and warmings are realistic possibilities over the medium-term future.

The current UN focus on "fighting climate change," as illustrated in the Nov. 27 UN Development Programme's Human Development Report, is distracting governments from adapting to the threat of inevitable natural climate changes, whatever forms they may take. National and international planning for such changes is needed, with a focus on helping our most vulnerable citizens adapt to conditions that lie ahead. Attempts to prevent global climate change from occurring are ultimately futile, and constitute a tragic misallocation of resources that would be better spent on humanity's real and pressing problems.

posted by Polish Immigrant  # 9:46 PM 0 comments

F in science, A in self-esteem

American 15-year-olds go up against teens from around the world.


We could focus on the latest worrisome news in education: the results of an international test released last week that show American 15-year-olds don't know much about science and are falling behind their peers in other industrialized nations. But why get depressed?

There is an aluminum foil lining: The test also found that our teens don't let their ignorance bother them. They may not know as much as students in Finland, Canada or New Zealand, but they think they do. When asked to rate their own scientific abilities, they put themselves at the top with their better-educated peers.

This is the real trend in American education. No one can match us when it comes to self-esteem. So what if American students ranked 21st out of 30 industrialized nations? So what if we're even worse in math -- 25th? We know what you're thinking: "Well, we're more ethnically diverse than those countries. We have more poverty. More immigrants." Sorry, the poor and immigrants and the ethnically diverse in other countries scored higher than ours.

Still, our students are blissful in their ignorance. Test analysts found that the less students knew about science, the more optimistic they were that the challenges of global warming can be overcome. Given the burden of their superior education, it's no wonder the French are so grumpy.

posted by Polish Immigrant  # 8:55 PM 0 comments

Jeanne Assam is hailed for saving countless lives in shooting a gunman outside her church, but the volunteer security guard insisted that her steady hand was a matter of divine guidance.

A man from Pasadena, Texas, who shot and killed two illegal aliens after they burglarized a neighbor's house remains under investigation by the local police over the incident, which has divided the community between people who consider the shooter a "good neighbor" and others who think he is a murderer.

posted by Polish Immigrant  # 8:46 PM 0 comments