Truth, Lies and Common Sense

10 Years without Global Warming and Counting

2008-05-02T03:30:00.009-04:00

In 2001 Dr. Don J. Easterbrook, Professor Emeritus Geology, Western Washington University presented a paper in Boston at the national Geological Society of America meeting Saying that we were going into a 30 year cooling cycle.

Dr Easterbrook said,

"You should have seen the stunned look on people’s faces. We’d just had the 1998 warm peak and people were astonished. I said, look at the data and forget CO2."

His paper correlated 30 year warming and cooling cycles with solar activity and was confident that upcoming cooling cycle is inevitable. Read an interview with him here.

Dr. Easterbrook clarifies this chart as follows,

“The projected warming from ~2040 to ~2070 is NOT driven by CO2, it’s merely a continuation of warm/cool cycles over the past 500 years, long before man-made CO2 could have been a factor. We’ve been warming up from the Little Ice Age at rate of about 1 degree or so per century and the 2040-70 projection is simply a continuation of non-AGW cycles.

An interesting question is the similarity between what we are seeing now with sun spots and global temperature and the drop into the Little Ice Age from the Medieval Warm Period. Could we be about to repeat that? Only time will tell–We might see a more pronounced cool period like the 1880 to 1910 cool cycle (when many temp records were set) or a milder cooling like the 1945-1977 cool cycle. In any case, the setting up of the cool phase of the PDO seems to suggest cooler times ahead, not the catastrophic warming predicted by IPCC and Al Gore.”

Dr. Easterbrook further notes that NASA says the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) had shifted to its cool phase (Fig. Below) and is right on schedule as predicted by past climate and PDO changes. He emphasizes that this PDO change

"is not an oddity superimposed upon and masking the predicted severe warming by the IPCC."

This PDO cooling phase could last 20-30 years and just reinforces his solar cycle cooling phase.

Now scientists from Germany are saying in Nature (supplemental info) that global warming could take a break in the next decade thanks to a natural shift in ocean circulations.

From AFP - They base the prediction on what they believe is an impending change in the Gulf Stream -- the conveyor belt that transports warm surface water from the tropical Atlantic to the northern Atlantic and returns cold water southwards at depth.

The Gulf Stream will temporarily weaken over the next decade, in line with what has happened regularly in the past, the researchers say.

This will lead to slightly cooler temperatures in the North Atlantic and in North America and Europe, and also help the temperatures in the tropical Pacific to remain stable, they suggest.

Just to be clear the authors state the following,

"We are not stating that anthropogenic [man-made] climate change won't be as bad as previously thought," said Mojib Latif, a professor at the Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences in Kiel, northern Germany.

"What we are saying is that on top of the warming trend, there is a long-periodic oscillation that will probably lead to a lower temperature increase than we would expect from the current trend during the next years."

They didn't discuss if their model accounts for the fact that there has been no warming for the last 10 years.

So if Dr. Eastbrook's solar cycle theory is correct and the PDO lasts as long as 20-30 years we will have cooling. Now add to that the Atlantic conveyor weakening and this could be a cooling as deep as 1880-1910. We'll know soon enough.

(Article and supplement via Watts Up With That)

Barack Obama's Credibility Problem

2008-04-29T01:11:00.002-04:00

Obama this week threw his pastor, Jeremiah Wright, under the bus just like his grandmother in his speech on race. Why did Barack wait until this past weekend to dropkick Rev. Wright? The Pastor didn't say anything different then in his previous sermons.

Don't get me wrong I think Pastor Wright does a disservice to those he preaches to spreading this theology of victim hood and instilling further hate in the young growing up in his church.

So why did Barack feign shock now? Does he still think we're stupid? Does he think we believe that he didn't know that his pastor had this side to him? Everyone else in the church knew their pastor. Everyone in Chicago knew the good and bad about Jeremiah Wright. But Barack Obama, legal scholar, was clueless?

No, No, No, No! Barack wasn't clueless. He knows full well what his preacher is about and still he brings his little girls to learn the theology of victim hood.

The only thing new that Pastor Wright said was a little known truth. What was this truth? What truth is so shocking that Barack Obama had to toss his Pastor aside?

Pastor Wright bottom-lined the whole thing when he said that Barack said what he had to say in the speech, distancing himself a little from the Pastor, because Barack is just a "politician" that says what he thinks the people want to hear.

Of course the pastor and Barack talked last year about this dance that is occurring between Wright and Obama. In April of 2007 in a New York Times article: Pastor Wright is quoted as saying,

“If Barack gets past the primary, he might have to publicly distance himself from me,” Mr. Wright said with a shrug. “I said it to Barack personally, and he said yeah, that might have to happen.”

This well choreographed dance is too slick for even "Slick Willie." The entire concept that Barack didn't know his pastor just doesn't pass the smell test. It just isn't credible.

Obama Too Good for Small Town America

2008-03-26T16:48:00.001-04:00

Barack again revealed his true disdain for "ordinary Americans."

During a fundraiser of fellow elitist, wealthy donors in San Francisco that was closed to the press Barack said the following in an answer to a question about whether he was having trouble courting working-class voters

""You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them, and they fell through the Clinton Administration, and the Bush Administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations." "

So for 25 years small town America has clung to guns and religion and antipathy... whooaaa! Let me say this in small town American language,

It's not surprising then they've chose to be angry, gun toting, bible thumping, bigoted, anti-immigrant, protectionists as a way to explain their frustrations.

This is just another example of Barack and his wife's elitist attitude. They have refined an incredibly leftist socialist outlook on how things should be.

Electric Cars Move Over

2008-03-25T02:10:00.001-04:00

How would you feel about a car that gets over 100 miles per gallon, seats six, has a 35 cubic foot trunk and a top speed of 96mph. Not good enough for all you greens out there? How about the fact that it emits less then 1/4 the total emissions of the Toyota Prius. Of course if it is going under 35 miles per hour there are no emissions but cold pure clean filtered air.

What powers this car? Air. You heard it, compressed air. An onboard compressor allows the tanks to be recharged in 2-4 hours but once air stations are on line the tanks should be able to be charged up in 3 minutes. This Air Car has a supplemental energy source to kick in north of 35 mph, ZPM says. A custom heating chamber heats the air in a process officials refused to elaborate upon, though they insisted it would increase volume and thus the car’s range and speed. 8 gallons of fuel will get you 800 plus miles.

What's the catch? As always it must be too expensive. Not in this case, ZPM expects to sell the cars for $17,800 starting in early 2010.

So to sum it up:

ZPM said it plans to produce a six-seat, four-door family-sized version of its compressed air vehicle to the U.S. market. this model will achieve over 100 mpg, over 90 mph capability, have zero to low CO2 emissions, offer plenty of space for luggage, meet all safety requirements, and cost no more than an average midsize car. The first compressed air car is expected to roll off the production line for US purchase in 2010 and cost around US$18,000.

Obama Doesn't question

2008-03-24T03:12:00.010-04:00

"white-hating, anti-American" Sentiment

I was updating my blogroll and checked out Prestopundit for the first time in years and he has the following quote at the top of his page.

"Questions of effectiveness, and not sentiment, caused most of my quarrels with [a white-hating, anti-American follower of Louis Farrakhan]." -- Barack Obama, Dreams From My Father

Not having read the book I am ignorant of the context but I am curious if the "white-hating, anti-American follower of Louis Farrakhan" is his pastor or an old college pal? Whether or not this was his pastor that he quarreled with it appears that Obama agreed with the "white-hating, anti-American" sentiment. He just didn't think that was a very effective public stand.

Obama's Consultant, CEO of Passport Gate

2008-03-23T02:10:00.006-04:00

CNN reports that the latest employee to breach passport security works for a company whose CEO consults for Obama. Interesting that this employee is the only one of the three not to have been fired. Just when the campaign desperately needed to change the subject from Pastor Wright.

Coincidence? Most likely, but curious non the less.

The CEO of a company whose employee is accused of improperly looking at the passport files of presidential candidates is a consultant to the Barack Obama campaign, a source said Saturday.

John O. Brennan, president and CEO of the Analysis Corp., advises the Illinois Democrat on foreign policy and intelligence issues, the source said.

Brennan briefed the media on behalf of the campaign this month.

The executive is a former senior CIA official and former interim director of the National Counterterrorism Center.

He contributed $2,300 to the Obama campaign in January.

When asked about the contribution, a State Department official told CNN's Zain Verjee, "We ethically awarded contracts. Political affiliation is not one of the factors that we check."

Read the rest of the article

Al Gore's Religion is Based on Flawed Doctrine

2008-03-22T01:14:00.001-04:00

Geoff Metcalf reports on a Washington Times commentary.

It turns out the latest underreported bad news for disciples of the gospel according to Al Gore is that reports by the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) are "flawed and cannot be supported."

Commentary By H. Sterling Burnett

In a 2001 report, the IPCC published an image commonly referred to as the "hockey stick." This graph showed relatively stable temperatures from A.D. 1000 to 1900, with temperatures rising steeply from 1900 to 2000. The IPCC and public figures, such as former Vice President Al Gore, have used the hockey stick to support the conclusion that human energy use over the last 100 years has caused unprecedented rise global warming.

However, several studies cast doubt on the accuracy of the hockey stick, and in 2006 Congress requested an independent analysis of it. A panel of statisticians chaired by Edward J. Wegman, of George Mason University, found significant problems with the methods of statistical analysis used by the researchers and with the IPCC's peer review process. For example, the researchers who created the hockey stick used the wrong time scale to establish the mean temperature to compare with recorded temperatures of the last century. Because the mean temperature was low, the recent temperature rise seemed unusual and dramatic. This error was not discovered in part because statisticians were never consulted.

Furthermore, the community of specialists in ancient climates from which the peer reviewers were drawn was small and many of them had ties to the original authors - 43 paleoclimatologists had previously coauthored papers with the lead researcher who constructed the hockey stick.

These problems led Mr. Wegman's team to conclude that the idea that the planet is experiencing unprecedented global warming "cannot be supported."

There's more, continue reading

Obama wants a Conversation, Let's Start Here

2008-03-21T01:04:00.000-04:00

A Brief for Whitey by Patrick J. Buchanan

In this article Pat Buchanan continues the conversation on race that Senator Obama started in his speech. He starts by correcting the context of the conversation.

Excerpt

Yes, Barack agreed, Wright's statements were "controversial," and "divisive," and "racially charged," reflecting a "distorted view of America."

But we must understand the man in full and the black experience out of which the Rev. Wright came: 350 years of slavery and segregation.

Barack then listed black grievances and informed us what white America must do to close the racial divide and heal the country.

The "white community," said Barack, must start "acknowledging that what ails the African-American community does not just exist in the minds of black people; that the legacy of discrimination -- and current incidents of discrimination, while less overt than in the past -- are real and must be addressed. Not just with words, but with deeds ... ."

And what deeds must we perform to heal ourselves and our country?

The "white community" must invest more money in black schools and communities, enforce civil rights laws, ensure fairness in the criminal justice system and provide this generation of blacks with "ladders of opportunity" that were "unavailable" to Barack's and the Rev. Wright's generations.

What is wrong with Barack's prognosis and Barack's cure?

Only this. It is the same old con, the same old shakedown that black hustlers have been running since the Kerner Commission blamed the riots in Harlem, Watts, Newark, Detroit and a hundred other cities on, as Nixon put it, "everybody but the rioters themselves."

Read the whole article.

Jesse Jackson is a Typical White Person

2008-03-20T01:00:00.001-04:00

I never knew this about Jesse but Barack Obama clarified it for me as he tried to explain what he meant when he threw his grandmother under the bus during his speech on race. Here, talking about Pastor Wright, is what Obama said during his speech.

I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother – a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.

So he equates the hate filled rants of Pastor Wright to the "black community" and equates this Pastor's publicly spewed hate rants to the occasional "racial or ethnic stereotypes" his grandmother would utter in private.

I have worked with and for members of the "black community" and have never found them hate filled. I didn't know his grandmother so I am glad he explained himself yesterday.

Radio Station 610 WIP host Angelo Cataldi asked Obama about his Tuesday morning speech on race in which he referenced his own white grandmother and her prejudice. Obama told the host that:

"The point I was making was not that Grandmother harbors any racial animosity. She doesn't. But she is a typical white person, who, if she sees somebody on the street that she doesn't know, you know, there's a reaction that's been bred in our experiences that don't go away and that sometimes come out in the wrong way, and that's just the nature of race in our society."

Interesting how she went from being afraid of "black men" to just being afraid of strangers. Aren't typical black women walking alone on the street equally fearful of strangers? Inserting "somebody on the street that she doesn't know" for "black men" in the original speech just doesn't seem to fit does it. I suspect he still meant black men but for some reason couldn't say it.

I find this clarification interesting for a couple of reasons. The obvious one is that he is doing exactly what he accused is grandmother of. He uttered a racial or ethnic stereotype in trying to explain his grandmother's utterances of racial or ethnic stereotypes.

Now there are some "typical white" people that would take offense to this use of stereotype. They might equate Senator Obama's stereotyping white people with some of the bigoted rants of Pastor Wright and think that maybe the Senator is aligned closer with Pastor Wright's theology of hate more then he admits.

Could this be a NAFTA situation? He told Ohio folks he would renegotiate NAFTA while simultaneously having his advisor tell Canada that it meant nothing, just campaign talk to get votes. Since he is prone to lying in his quest to pander for votes could he be condemning the words of his Pastor while at the same time agreeing with his philosophy? The answer is probably not. However as long has he doesn't confront why he stayed in a church for 20 years with Pastor Wright's bigoted philosophy at it's core we will never know for sure.

I almost forgot the title of this post. In 1996 Jesse Jackson said,

'There is nothing more painful for me at this stage in my life than to walk down the street and hear footsteps and start thinking about robbery -- and then look around and see somebody white and feel relieved.''
as quoted in US News, 3/10/96

So Jesse Jackson is a "a typical white person" and Jesse's reaction was "a reaction that's been bred in" his experiences.

Thank you Senator Obama for clarifying that for me.

Obama's Double Standard

2008-03-19T00:55:00.001-04:00

Obama imus
Video sent by dollarsandsense123
Barack Obama talks about offensive comedic remarks made by Don Imus and shows a gigantic double standard. In this video I think he shows proper judgment in his assessment. Here he shows concern for his daughters and talks about not going on Imus' show because he doesn't want to be an enabler.

I would like to know why he didn't apply this good sense to the church he attended. Taking his two young daughters to an environment that not only preaches love but also hate in my opinion is a confusing way to raise impressionable young girls.

Why did he choose to be an enabler of Pastor Wright for 20 years. He asks us to believe that he never heard the worst examples of Pastor Wright such as the Aids rant or the God Damn America rant. It is hard for me to believe he didn't know, since this philosophy is part of Pastor Wright's Theology.

Barack Obama easily passed judgment on Imus after a short offensive statement and decided then and there not to be an enabler, but I guess as long as bigotry is in the form of a religion he is OK with it.

Update: It seems that someone strung together a video of this double standard.

Obama - Judgment = Just Another Politician

2008-03-18T00:47:00.001-04:00

After the events of the last week I think all of those people who pray at the alter of Obama-mania will have to think twice. After the videos of his pastor of the last 20 years surfaced all over the web and television Obama responded with the same old dishonest political methods.

The Dishonesty of Hope
Our New Nixon
Obama: From Valiant to Victicrat

1. Obama and his group attacked the messenger by trying to insinuate that they are isolated statements taken out of context. That the media was just peddling a characterization of the pastor. The truth is that the church was peddling their DVDs of his presumably best sermons in their gift shop. One could assume that these sermons are his proudest moments.

2. He took the attitude that we all have a crazy uncle in our family and we just look the other way and pretend he doesn't really embarrass us. He says that everyone has experienced pastors with positions they didn't agree with. As if radical Pastors, priests or Rabbis are a common occurrence around the USA.

There are two problems with this thinking.

The first problem is that you can't pick your family. You can choose where you go to church and can choose to use sound judgment not to subject your daughters to sermons that preach so much good mixed with messages of hate. How do young girls sort through and separate the good from the hate?

Second, the rest of America does not run into pastors with radical views in their churches. This is the worst form of moral equivalency, equating hate speech with say the struggle in some churches between "choice" and "life." There is no comparison but the Democrats, in this case Obama, think that all these things are on a morally equal footing. After all it's all relative.

The vast majority of folks in this country, if they heard their pastor preaching hate, would stand up and confront the hate. If it turned out the hate was part of the church doctrine they would walk and find another church.

He hasn't led in his own church. He hasn't been able to confront, educate or persuade his own pastor, he sat there like a lamb, nodding in agreement. How can we expect him to confront dictators around the world.

3. Shock! He acknowledges that what the Pastor said was terrible and he doesn't agree with any of it. He clarifies his position further by saying he never actually witnessed this kind of rhetoric while he was in the pews of his church and wasn't aware of any controversy until the start of his campaign.

So he honestly expects us to believe that after being active in the church for 20 years he only became aware of Pastor Wright's extremist views a year ago?

4. He gives an excellently sounding speech where he now says,

"Did I ever hear him make remarks that could be considered controversial while I sat in church? Yes."

I will let others dissect the speech but this speech struck me has a bait and switch scheme. Instead of addressing the reason he stayed in this church with his daughters even though he knew they would be exposed to controversial hate speech. He changed the subject to excuse the Pastor and imply that this hate speech was understandable etc...

Read the articles below on the speech.

Three Big Problems With Barack's Speech
Guilting America to the White House
Obama's Speech Failed
Obama’s Evasions
Strategic Miss
Wright Bound
MoveOn Move In
Geraldine Ferraro resents being lumped in with the Rev. Wright in Obama speech
Throw grandma under the bus, part 1, part 2

So it turns out that the Saviour is just another politician excellent in the time tested tradition of political double talk.

Ethanol, Are you kidding me?

2008-03-17T01:08:00.002-04:00

I find it interesting that in the 70s it was forecast that by the 90s we wouldn't be able to grow enough food to feed the folks of this land and wars would be fought over food. Well it is 2008 and not only do we think we can grow enough food but we say what the hell let's grow food and burn it to move our cars.

Does it matter that it is inefficient? Does it matter that it can't be done without Big Corn getting handouts from Uncle Sam? Does it matter that it will drive up the cost on all food from wheat to beef? Who suffers the most from increased food costs, the rich? I don't think so. What about other unintended consequences? Check out this short video "food vs fuel".

Dr Walter Williams has some interesting info on "Big Corn"

Ethanol is 20 to 30 percent less efficient than gasoline, making it more expensive per highway mile. It takes 450 pounds of corn to produce the ethanol to fill one SUV tank. That's enough corn to feed one person for a year. Plus, it takes more than one gallon of fossil fuel -- oil and natural gas -- to produce one gallon of ethanol. After all, corn must be grown, fertilized, harvested and trucked to ethanol producers -- all of which are fuel-using activities. And, it takes 1,700 gallons of water to produce one gallon of ethanol. On top of all this, if our total annual corn output were put to ethanol production, it would reduce gasoline consumption by 10 or 12 percent. Read more...

Call me old fashioned, but I still think food is best served on the table to hungry folks. This increase in food prices is not just affecting folks here in the USA. Since this is one area where we excel, diverting corn and acreage to fuel production drives up the cost of food around the globe without any decrease in fuel prices.

Higher food prices for the poor of all countries, just one of the many unintended consequences of "going green."

Hillary Mocks Obama's Naivete

2008-03-17T00:44:00.002-04:00

Hillary mocks obama
Video sent by dollarsandsense123

How naive does someone have to be to have Hillary take the piss out of him?

Truth, Lies and Common Sense is back!

2008-03-16T02:27:00.002-04:00

For the last couple of years this blog was stagnant. I didn't have much incentive to keep things going. I ran into a wall, I renamed it "Walt's Brain" and put up fluff. But I am back and ready to take up the mantle of sifting through the bullshit which is America's main stream media.

I hope you will comment on occasion and let me know what you think.

Merry Christmas, My Friend

2006-12-25T01:20:00.000-05:00

"A Soldier's Silent Night" was written by Marine Lance Corporal James M. Schmidt in 1986. It was originally written as a poem but has since been adapted and set to the tune of Mannheim Steamroller's Stille Nacht. The original title of the poem was "Merry Christmas, My Friend" and was specifically tailored for the Marine Corps.

Election Day

2006-11-07T01:31:00.000-05:00

Let me start by saying if all you know about the topics in this election were gathered through sound bites and commercials then Please Don't Vote. There is no shame in understanding your limitations.

Just thought I'd share the results of a quiz that identifies your political leanings. You can take the quiz too.

Life is Good!

Extreme Curling

2006-08-30T20:55:00.000-04:00

The artist captioned this piece with, "Since it is played at the Olympic Games, Curling really took wing ;-)"

extreme curling
flickr author: Klokhuys

Tags: photos,beautiful,art,life

Coming to America

2006-08-29T02:09:00.000-04:00

I love this song. I'm sure all of us who live in the U.S. have stories passed down in our families of our ancestors coming to America.

International Symbol for Quiet

2006-08-15T02:10:00.000-04:00

Some symbols are are familiar around the world.

_ Shut up _
flickr author: NuageDeNuit

Tags: photos,beautiful,art,life

The Simpsons: Real Life Vs. Cartoon

2006-08-01T05:57:00.000-04:00

Here is a real live opening scene for The Simpsons cartoon side by side with the cartoon version of the same.

Excellently done.

PS. the real live version was created for SKY1 TV in the UK.

All The Small Things

2006-07-19T03:40:00.000-04:00

Well, if you ever had any doubt that girls are girls the world over here is Lynne and Tessa from Germany in a video they did for GoogleIdol in the Webcam division.

Check out their web page.

Surprise!

2006-07-18T00:12:00.000-04:00

When he woke he found his "friends" had delivered a living prank.

i crush your nose
flickr author: maody

Tags: photos,beautiful,art,life

Kamaole Beach Park

2006-07-11T07:14:00.000-04:00

One of the three beautiful Kamaole beach parks in South Maui. This is a beautiful shot but the most interesting thing about this photo is what you don't see. This photo was taken by a remote controled camera hanging from a kite.

kam 3
flickr author: Haiku Garry

Tags: photos,beautiful,art,life

4th of July Fireworks

2006-07-05T03:39:00.000-04:00

For those of you who missed seeing fireworks on Independence Day.

Underdog Cheerios Commercial

2006-07-02T22:39:00.000-04:00

Remember the cartoon hero Underdog?

The opening dialog sounded like this.

Crowd, "Look, up in the sky, it's a bird, it's a plane, it's a frog...a frog?"

Underdog, "Not bird, nor plane, nor even frog, it's just little 'ole me, Underdog!"

What is most interesting is the fact that Underdog was created as an avenue for General Mills to sell cereal. Here is a commercial from the early days of taped TV commercials.