My Thanksgiving Greeting

Before I head into a turkey-induced stupor, I'll leave you with these two wonderful clips of the great Rudolph Nureyev and Margot Fonteyn. The first clip is the first time they danced together shortly after Nureyev defected. The second clip will leave your head spinning!

I hope you enjoy them as much as I did. Have a Great Thanksgiving, and remember that we all have so much for which to be thankful:





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Thanks, Global Warming

Ithaca, NY, where I work, is in the Finger Lakes region of upstate New York. Ithacans hate global warming because it is so corporate and capitalist.

So at what point in time should global warming have stopped?

"The 'Ice age' was really a series of many advances and retreats of glaciers. The Finger Lakes were probably carved by several of these episodes. Ice sheets more than two miles thick flowed southward, parallel but opposite to the flow of the rivers, gouging deep trenches into these river valleys. Traces of most of the earlier glacial events have vanished, but much evidence remains of the last one or two glaciers that covered New York.

The latest glacial episode was most extensive around 21,000 years ago, when glaciers covered almost the entire state. Around 19,000 years ago, the climate warmed, and the glacier began to retreat, disappearing entirely from New York for the last time around 11,000 years ago." (Image source here)

For me, I'll just say "thanks global warming," we couldn't have done it without you.

Update, from the Hmmm Dept: Pretending the climate email leak isn't a crisis won't make it go away and NZ’s NIWA accused of CRU-style temperature faking.

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I'll Have Some Palin Derangement Syndrome with my Turkey, Please

Sarah Palin's visit to a turkey farm last year made news when the camera caught a shot of the owner slaughtering a turkey. The NY Times Editorial Board was all over the controversy.

Turns out the farmer in question has had a tough year, for a number of reasons, mostly related to the economy.

But when Andie Coller at Politico covered the farmer's fate, the focus naturally was on Palin (image right).

Because no Thanksgiving would be complete without a headline and photo suggesting that Palin had caused this poor farmer's problems, even if the article itself pointed out that the economy -- not Palin's visit -- was the cause.

So on this Thanksgiving, Politico readers will get a small side order of Palin Derangement Syndrome with their turkey, no extra charge.

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How Do They Think This Stuff Up? Part 2

Another post by Matthew Yglesias engaging in gross generalizations and stereotypes of the politically acceptable kind, Stuff White People Like: Disapproving of Barack Obama:

The diversity issues that you see at the elite level of most of American life are, in my opinion, particularly egregious in the punditry world. People whose job is largely to express a point of view really ought to come from a variety of points of view, and it’s a huge problem in politics since demographics are so closely linked to political opinion....

About 50 percent of Americans approve of Obama’s job performance, but he’s overwhelmingly liked among non-white Americans and quite widely disliked by white Americans. Our punditry, however, is done almost exclusively by white people and pretty overwhelmingly by a demographic of older white men that’s pretty much the most right-wing cohort you can construct.

If demographics drive political opinion, then I suppose the types of pundits Ygelsias wants to see more of are the Thomas Sowell type, and less of the Keith Olbermann/Frank Rich type.

Like I said, how do they think this stuff up?

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Please Tell Me This Is Not So

I really hope this is a bad Photoshop, not the real thing. From DrudgeReport: "Obama leaves WH clutching GQ mag -- featuring himself...

No matter what I have said in the past, I truly do not want this to be so.

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Is "Finish the Job" the New "Peace With Honor"?

Obama's new Afghanistan strategy, to be announced formally next week, centers around the phrase "finish the job."

That is an interesting concept. Seems simlar to "peace with honor," a very Nixonian phrase signaling that we will claim one thing (the dreaded "V" word) while accepting something else (the dreaded "D" word).

Even the NY Times twists itself into knots figuring out how to signal to friend and foe that we are in it to win it, while simultaneously signaling that we are preparing a way to get out:

Over the next week, [Obama] will deliver multiple messages to multiple audiences: voters at home, allies, the leaders of Afghanistan and Pakistan, and the extremists who are the enemy. And as Mr. Obama’s own aides concede, the messages directed at some may undercut the messages sent to others....

So it is no surprise that one of Mr. Obama’s senior aides, speaking on the condition of anonymity, acknowledged Tuesday that the forthcoming speech was a “potential minefield.” One of his national security strategists put Mr. Obama’s challenge this way: The trick, he said, will be “signaling resolve to the allies while not signaling open-ended commitment to the American people.”

We'll see what Obama says and does, and it would be unfair to judge him based on leaks, even if it is clear that the leaks are authorized and part of the White House communications strategy.

One word I'll be waiting to hear is "Victory." I have a feeling I'll be disappointed.

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Counting Non-White People At Palin Book Signings

Does playing the race card never grow old? Apparently not when Palin Derangement Syndrome is at work.

At Lawyers, Guns and Money blog, Scott Eric Kaufman is counting non-white people at Sarah Palin book signings, with smoking gun photos such as the photo (right) of white hands at the signing table.

And all because Darleen Click [is that really her name?] at Protein Wisdom, in responding to some comments to her post about PDS, called out those who harp on the race of people at Palin rallies. Proving that no comment at a post should be left unturned, Kaufman writes:

Time to play "Count the Non-White People"! [followed by 12 linked crowd photos]

In all those photographs, there is one non-white person who can be positively identified as having come of their own accord. To Click, pointing out that Palin's own handlers consider her appeal limited to white people makes me a racist. Over in the increasingly diverse place known as the United States, this is why people like Click should hunker down for a long run of political disappointment.

Being meticulous, Kaufman notes that the non-white person in one photo was just a "security guard." In another photo showing three Asian people, Kaufman postulates "but only one identifiably of her own volition." Yes, because any non-white person who attended a Palin book signing must be there involuntarily, apparently.

I wonder if Kaufman also is counting all the non-white hosts at MSNBC. Maybe that explains why MSNBC is failing.

I would have included this in my Saturday Night Card Game series, but I just couldn't wait.

But maybe I have it all wrong. Maybe Kaufman actually was counting white people. Would that make it better?

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HuffPo's Reliable Counter-Indicator

Allison Kilkenny at HuffPo (September 24, 2009 11:34 AM) on the right-wing inspired killing of Bill Sparkman:

By utilizing the branding "Fed," the killers were clearly trying to make a political statement, namely "Obama: Stay Out."

Worst call since the criticism of John Bolton for warning that the North Koreans were planning a nuclear test, just days before the North Koreans conducted a nuclear test:

Bolton's stance is pretty brave because his frenzied ideology flies in the face of scholarly counsel.

I think she is a counter-indicator. Someone let me know what she thinks the stock market will do tomorrow.

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Calling For Sparkman Apologies

The Kentucky state police announced that the death of Bill Sparkman was an elaborate suicide made to look like a murder so that Sparkman's son could collect on his insurance policy. Robert Stacy McCain has all the details and updates.

I'll let others delve into all the sordid facts. What I want are some apologies from all the left-wing blog ghouls who danced on Bill Sparkman's grave hoping to score points by blaming conservatives for the death, as detailed in my post Ghouls Preparing To Dance on Sparkman's Grave.

The theory went that right-wing concerns over government power incited anti-government violence. Here are the bloggers specifically quoted in my prior post pushing this agenda:

• Think Progress,
• Steve Benen,
• Andrew Sullivan,
• MyDD,
• Crooks and Liars,
• Richard Benjamin,
• Mark Kleiman and
• No More Mister Nice Blog, among many.

I'll be following these blogs to see who owns up to their smears. And I'll let you know.

UPDATE: What others are saying:

• Michelle Malkin: When will the Left retract the Kentucky census worker case smear?
• Sister Toldjah: Breaking: KY investigators say Census worker likely killed himself
• JammieWearingFool: Census Worker Killed Himself and the Credibility of Leftwing Bloggers
• DaTechGuy: Bill Sparkman, Haditha and Duke all over again
• American Power: Bill Sparkman's Death Ruled Suicide: Meanwhile, Deafening Silence on the Radical Left?
• Jack Blood: Take it back Rachel Madcow! – Kentucky Census Worker Killed Himself
• Allahpundit: Census worker murdered by conservatives not actually murdered by conservatives
• Matthew Moynihan: Send the Body To Glenn Beck!
• Matt Welch: Remember That Census-Worker Murder, the One Michele Bachmann Was Supposed to Apologize For?
• McCain follow up: "Where do to the people of Clay County go to get their reputation back?"

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Hacked E-mails Skeptic No More

When the story of the e-mails "hacked" (or leaked) from a British climate institute first exploded, I was very cautious. I'm turning from a "hacked e-mails skeptic" to a "hacked e-mails believer" for two reasons.

First, numerous bloggers have done a good job exploring and explaining the e-mails (including, but certainly not limited to, Doug Ross, John Hinderaker, Andrew Bolt, and James Delingpole). Even supporters of global warming theories recognize the damaging nature of the e-mails, although still defending the overall nature of the science.

Second, the conduct of the left-wing blogs and mainstream media reflects an uneasiness. An initial couple of days of dismissiveness have given way to a silence reminiscent of the Van Jones affair. As the videos and audios of Jones dribbled out day-after-day, the usually vocal blogs and mainstream media pundits fell silent, reduced to watching centrist- and right-wing blogs and Fox News dig out the truth.

The final chapter has not been written, but it appears that the "hacked" e-mails are genuine, and reflect genuine intellectual dishonesty among researchers at and interacting with a prominent climate control institute.

How far the scandal goes remains to be seen. But some things are for sure:

The mainstream media will play little or no role in investigating the scandal, and will actively attempt to marginalize the effects by focusing on how the e-mails were obtained. And the left-wing blogs will have no choice but to sit idly by as the Van Joneses of the global warming community twist in the wind.

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Another Warning on Turkey's Islamist Slide

Last January, I warned of a dangerous slide by Turkey into the Islamist orbit, Turkey Looking Like The Next Iran. About a month ago, I further noted Caroline Glick's excellent article about Turkey's coziness with Iran and anti-democratic Islamism, Turkey is Lost to Islamists.

In response to Glick's article, with a link also to my posts, blogger and professor Robert Farley at Lawyer, Guns and Money blog not only accused Glick of not being concerned with Israel's survival, but also dismissed concerns about Turkey: "It's difficult to plow through the many layers of rank idiocy in the assertion that Turkey is 'lost to the Islamists.'"

Not that The Washington Post is the last word on the subject, but I take note of this interesting editorial (not an op-ed) today:

Yet, as his tenure lengthens, it is becoming evident that Mr. [Recep Tayyip] Erdogan's commitment to democratic principles and Western values is far from complete. As Turkey's prospects of joining the European Union have dimmed, the government's foreign policy has taken a nasty turn: Shrill denunciations of Israel have been accompanied by increasing coziness with the criminal rulers of Iran, Syria and Sudan. Mr. Erdogan recently declared that Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, who has been indicted for war crimes in Darfur, was welcome in Turkey because "a Muslim can never commit genocide."

Even more concerning is Mr. Erdogan's treatment of the Turkish media. Frustrated by hostility toward his government by media conglomerates that formed part of Turkey's traditional secular establishment, the prime minister and his allies have resorted to increasingly heavy-handed measures....

Mr. Erdogan and his party were once seen by many in Washington as a model for how pious Muslims could practice democratic politics. That image is rapidly darkening. If it is not to be extinguished, Mr. Erdogan must stop coddling Muslim dictators -- and stop following their practice of silencing domestic opposition.

If the apologists at Lawyers, Guns and Money want to play word games over whether Turkey is "lost," that is their prerogative.

But the rest of us don't need to play word games; if Turkey is not lost, Turkey is being lost to the Islamists and becoming the next Iran in part because of an attitude of denial and political correctness in the West.

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Why Are Democrats Holding Louisiana Hostage?

Mary Landrieu's deal for an extra $300 million in Medicaid funds for poor Louisiana residents has been hailed by Landrieu as a great victory for the people of Louisiana, and by just about everyone else as a shakedown of Harry Reid and the American people.

But there is another, equally unseemly, angle.

If the poor in Louisiana so badly need this assistance, why aren't Harry Reid and other Democrats who control Congress giving Louisiana the aid without the string attached of Landrieu's vote?

Why is Harry Reid using the poor of Louisiana as a bargaining chip? We know why, but let's spread the blame around to all corners where it is deserved.

When it comes to passing Obama-Pelosi-Reid-care, it seems hard to distinguish between hostage and hostage-taker.

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Nation Mag Outs Secret U.S. Anti-Terror Program

The Nation magazine has an extensive article detailing a classified operation in Pakistan by Blackwater, acting expressly under U.S. authority and coordination, to fight al-Qaeda:

At a covert forward operating base run by the US Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) in the Pakistani port city of Karachi, members of an elite division of Blackwater are at the center of a secret program in which they plan targeted assassinations of suspected Taliban and Al Qaeda operatives, "snatch and grabs" of high-value targets and other sensitive action inside and outside Pakistan, an investigation by The Nation has found. The Blackwater operatives also assist in gathering intelligence and help run a secret US military drone bombing campaign that runs parallel to the well-documented CIA predator strikes, according to a well-placed source within the US military intelligence apparatus.

Thank you for disclosing this program to make the nation less safe. The thank you comes not from me, but from the al-Qaeda operatives who will read your article and use the information to avoid capture, so they can kill Americans in Afghanistan and elsewhere.

Read the article. It is clear that the agenda is to get back at Donald Rumsfeld and other Bush administration personnel who helped organize covert efforts in Pakistan, and to play on the left-wing Blackwater Derangement Syndrome.

This is pathetic. There is no evidence in the article that anything illegal is taking place. This is nothing more or less than a deliberate attempt to harm the United States in its war against al-Qaeda.

Update: Figures, Raw Story uses The Nation article as an excuse to rehash the Seymour Hersh nonsense about Dick Cheney's "hit team." See my prior post, Sy Hersh DID Claim Cheney Ran "An Executive Assassination Ring".

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From The "I Didn't See This Coming" Dept.

Today is just filled with wonderment at the unexpected nature of being. From the "I didn't see this coming" department:

• Lawyer: 9/11 defendants want platform for views
• Obama's Nice Guy Act Gets Him Nowhere on the World Stage
• Wave of Debt Payments Facing U.S. Government
• Schumer: Dems ready to go-it-alone on health care
• Newspaper circulation may be worse than it looks
• Obama Thanks Hollywood With Coveted Invites To First White House State Dinner

Will wonders never cease?

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Diversity for Thee, But Not for We

Great post by Michelle Malkin pointing out that MSNBC, whose commentators routinely lash out at conservatives and Republicans as being all-white, is in fact all white:



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Worst Legislation Since The Great Depression

In my post the other day, Berkeley Students Should Be Protesting Obamacare, I made the point that the Berkeley student protesters were too stupid to realize that their future was being sold out from under them under the Obama-Pelosi-Reid health care restructuring plans because younger people were being asked to subsidize older people. Four years of higher tuition would be a drop in the bucket compared to decades of higher insurance premiums and taxes.

Now Robert J. Samuelson puts some more meat on that bone, with a column in The Washington Post titled Health 'reform' that burdens our young:

Now comes the House-passed health-care "reform" bill that, amazingly, would extract more subsidies from the young. It mandates that health insurance premiums for older Americans be no more than twice the level of that for younger Americans. That's much less than the actual health spending gap between young and old. Spending for those age 60 to 64 is four to five times greater than those 18 to 24. So, the young would overpay for insurance that -- under the House bill -- people must buy: Twenty- and thirtysomethings would subsidize premiums for fifty-and sixtysomethings. (Those 65 and over receive Medicare.)

Samuelson also lashes into AARP which is supporting Democratic proposals not because they are good for the whole country (contrary to AARP rhetoric) but because of the insurance premium cost-shifting from old to young:

Not surprisingly, the 40-million-member AARP, the major lobby for Americans over 50, was a big force behind this provision. AARP's cynicism is breathtaking. On one hand, it sponsors a high-minded campaign called "Divided We Fail" and runs sentimental TV ads featuring children pleading for a better tomorrow. "Join us in championing your future and the future of every generation," ended one ad.

Meanwhile, AARP lobbyists scramble to shift their members' costs onto younger generations. For example, the House health legislation improves Medicare's drug benefit. That would help the half of AARP members who are over 65. The other half, those between 50 and 64, could benefit from the skewed insurance premiums.

These bills are unique in that they take resources away from both seniors (through massive Medicare cuts) and juniors (through skewed insurance rates) in order to create a welfare entitlement system which will create massive fiscal problems for everyone.

Obama-Pelosi-Reid-Care is the Worst Legislation since the Great Depression. An equal opportunity loser. And the Berkeley protesters still are too stupid to realize it.

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Executing Paralyzed Hasan "Barbaric"

It is reported that Nidal Hasan, the Fort Hood shooter, is paralyzed. So you knew this was coming:

How barbaric that the military will seek to kill a man with no sensation in his body from the chest down. He might prefer it (I certainly would) but it's inexusable behavior for a civilized society and way beyond the pale of decency.

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Somebody Had A Bad Day

Saturday, November 21, 2009. State: Louisiana. Verdict: Bad Day. Proof:

• LSU butchers final few seconds


• "It's not $100 million; it's $300 million!"

Somebody is not happy.

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Landrieu To Hold Fundraiser for Reid

It gets curiouser and curiouser.

Yesterday, Mary Landrieu closed the deal for a payoff to Louisiana in exchange for her vote to let Harry Reid's health care restructuring bill go to Senate floor debate. The deal had been negotiated over weeks, with initial reports putting the price tag at $100 million, only to have Landrieu brag that the real price was $300 million.

Now, it turns out that Landrieu has agreed to hold a fundraiser for Reid in New Orleans:

Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., will host a fundraiser for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., in New Orleans next month, an event that comes on the heels of Reid's assistance getting Louisiana a windfall of Medicaid money in the health care reform bill.

The event was planned "several weeks ago," according to Landrieu's office. She and political consultant James Carville will host a brunch on Dec. 12 at the St. Charles Avenue home of David Voelker, an investor who chairs the Louisiana Recovery Authority and was a supporter of Barack Obama's presidential campaign.

I am sure the two are not connected. Just like Landrieu's vote had nothing to do with the payoff.

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Hacked E-mails or Else!

The other day, when the news of "hacked" e-mails from a British climate institute hit the internet, I wrote Why The "Hacked E-Mails" Don't Interest Me, Yet.

In the post, I noted that I did not have the time to devote to the hacked e-mails because I was too busy monitoring Andrew Sullivan's attempt to uncover what was in Sarah Palin's uterus in early 2008. Apparently another failed attempt at humor, because some of my readers took the post as an indication I didn't think the hacked e-mail issue was important.

So here's my take as of this moment in time:

1. It is not clear that the e-mails were "hacked," but may have been "leaked" by someone with the alleged "hacking" story to cover the leaker's trail. How the e-mails were obtained could be significant as to veracity, authenticity, and most important, significance.
2. I'm not sufficiently familiar with the e-mails to argue their significance based on my own review. But a growing body of analysis on the blogs and even the mainstream media demonstrates -- at a minimum -- that the specific scientists authoring the e-mails have been less than honest with the public as to underlying data, methodology, and politics.
3. It is going to be a stretch, in all likelihood, to argue that the e-mails show a worldwide conspiracy to doctor the science. The science is subject to dispute on its own merits by other scientists, so you don't need a conspiracy theory to challenge it.
4. We should be insisting on an open debate, rather than allowing people like Al Gore to shut down debate by accusing scientists with opposing views of being flat-earth types. The e-mails should be used to demonstrate why open debate still is needed.
5. The e-mails reflect that we should not take at face value the highly politicized arguments of some man-made global warming theorists or politicians like Al Gore who stand to make hundreds of millions of dollars from climate-change legislation.
6. The e-mails also demonstrate what we all have known to be true -- that left-wing academics hate people who disagree with them, and are willing to engage in de facto boycotts and intimidation in order to silence opposing opinions.

The "hacked" e-mails are significant, but it is too early to fully appreciate the full impact of the revelations. I hope bloggers keep digging and analyzing and disclosing.

Of course, the left will try to silence debate. That's what they do. My hope is that after a full analysis of the e-mails, and perhaps if some other brave souls leak information about politicized science, we can avoid disastrous economic policies like cap-and-trade resulting from global warming hysteria and political correctness.

If that is the case, here some other headlines which may go down in infamy, along with Dewey Defeats Truman, as having really bad timing, having been released on the eve of the e-mail disclosures:

• Climate Change Deniers' Smear Campaigns Exposed (James Boyce, HuffPo, November 19, 2009, 02:24 PM)(also at MyDD and Firedoglake)


• Will the GOP Nominate a Climate Change Denier in 2012? (Josh Nelson, HuffPo, November 18, 2009, 02:55 PM)


• Sen. Climate Change Denier endorses Fiorina (San Francisco Chronicle Politics Blog, November 18, 2009, 05:06 PM)


• Global Warming Deniers Beach Party poster (image).

The argument goes something like this: "Remember, the planet is depending on us. The Earth needs us. We only have four months to act, or it will be too late. Pass the stimulus health care cap-and-trade bill immediately or there will be catastrophe." The hacked e-mails burst this hysterical bubble, at a minimum.

Let's get it right, or our children will be swimming -- not in water -- but in economic ruin resulting from failed policies based on politicized science propagated by people with hidden agendas who stand to make fortunes off of our misery.

Update: The Milli Vanilli of Science: CRU Emails Unpeel the Warming Scam

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