News of the Week for May. 5th, 2013
- Gun Rights
- Hide the Decline
- Obamacare
- War & Terror
- National News
- Economy & Taxes
- International News
- Opinion
Gun Rights
Bravo, Gov. Brewer: New Arizona Law Requires Guns ‘Bought Back’ by Cities & Counties to Be Sold Again, Bans Destruction of Buyback Guns
Yesterday, Gov. Jan Brewer signed a bill into law requiring cities and counties with gun-buyback programs to sell the weapons. They are prohibited from destroying the buyback guns, as many of them were doing. The bill had cleared the state Senate earlier in April by an 18-12 vote, and the state House approved it last month.
Docs Show Napolitano Thanked Missouri Governor For Breaking State Law
Missouri Governor Jay Nixon repeatedly denied knowing anything about Missouri illegally sharing its citizens private CCW information with the federal government, even after his own head of Missouri Highway Patrol contradicted him in a public hearing. Now we’ve learned that Nixon not only knew about the violation of Missouri law, but he was thanked in a letter by Janet Napolitano
Status check on various gunmakers’ flights from various states.
Let’s look at the practical results of gun control, shall we? Three states have recently signed into law some hefty gun control laws; what were the results?
NRA’s new liberty culture war not like the old culture war
The NRA seems to be broadening the issue of gun control into a broader culture war issue. But it doesn’t seem to be the old religious/moral culture war, it’s more a liberty culture war.
Hide the Decline
Environment &
“Green Energy”
Negative Feedbacks: What They Are, and Why They Are Important
Carbon dioxide does influence the Earth’s climate, but it is just one variable among a great many, and its impact is small. Scientists agree that if you double the CO2 in the atmosphere, it will cause an increase in the Earth’s temperature of around one degree Celsius. Nearly all scientists also agree that an increase of that magnitude would be good, not bad, for humans.
Climate Craziness of the Week: Climate Change turns women into hookers?
Really? I guess this explains Mary Magdalene during the Roman Warm Period.
Russian Scientists say period of global cooling ahead due to changes in the sun
Russia’s Pulkovo Observatory: “we could be in for a cooling period that lasts 200-250 years”
The meteoric rise in Texas oil output continues and is one of the most remarkable energy success stories in US history
The Energy Information Administration released new US crude oil production data today for the month of February by state, and one of the highlights of the monthly update is that oil output in America’s No. 1 oil-producing state – Texas – continues its phenomenal, meteoric rise. Here are some details of oil output in “Saudi Texas”
The U.S. Has Much, Much More Gas and Oil Than We Thought
The United States has double the amount of oil and three times the amount of natural gas than previously thought, stored deep under the states of North Dakota, South Dakota, and Montana, according to new data the Obama administration released Tuesday.
CO2 sequestration research stumbles onto something useful: a big lithium strike in Wyoming
Most lithium (the lightest metal) is now mined in the Andes (image above), but it looks like the U.S. has more than a little of it too: [T]he Rock Springs Uplift’s 18 million tons of potential lithium reserves is equivalent to roughly 720 years of current global lithium production.
The tragedy of climatism: Resource misuse on a global scale
Last week, 13 members of the House of Representatives introduced a resolution “recognizing the disparate impact of climate change on women.” The resolution implied that man-made climate change was responsible for impacts on global women, stating “food insecure women with limited socioeconomic resources may be vulnerable to situations such as sex work, transactional sex, and early marriage that put them at risk for HIV, STIs, unplanned pregnancy, and poor reproductive health.” The resolution, however, ignores the real tragedy, which is the misguided policies to combat climate change.
San Jose State University Meteorology decides burning books they don’t agree with is better than reading them
From the Fahrenheit 451 department comes this indictment of California’s higher education’s “tolerance” for opposing views. When I first got the tip on this, I thought to myself “nobody can be this stupid to photograph themselves doing this” but, here they are, right from the San Jose State University Meteorology Department web page
Obamacare
Government in Healthcare
Botched ObamaCare rollout tops Democratic fears for 2014 election
Anxious Democrats fear a botched implementation of ObamaCare could dash their hopes of controlling the House and Senate for President Obama’s last two years in office.
War & Terror
BOMBSHELL: Saudi Arabia warned the United States IN WRITING about Tamerlan Tsarnaev in 2012, and rejected his application for an entry visa to visit Mecca in 2011
Saudis developed intelligence separately from Russia, which also warned the U.S. about the accused Boston bomber
A letter to the Department of Homeland Security named Tsarnaev and three Pakistanis as potential jihadis worthy of U.S. investigation
Red flags from Saudi Arabia included Tsarnaev’s name and information about a planned explosive attack on a major U.S. city
Saudi foreign minister, national security chief both met with Obama in the oval office in early 2013
THREATS AGAINST BENGHAZI WHISTLEBLOWERS ALLEGED
At least four career officials at the State Department and the Central Intelligence Agency have retained lawyers, or are in the process of doing so, as they prepare to provide sensitive information about the Benghazi attacks to Congress, Fox News has learned.
Iran source: President Ahmadinejad arrested
Taken to secret location for 7 hours before released
Tsarnaev family received $100G in benefits
The Tsarnaev family, including the suspected terrorists and their parents, benefited from more than $100,000 in taxpayer-funded assistance — a bonanza ranging from cash and food stamps to Section 8 housing from 2002 to 2012, the Herald has learned.
Chaffetz Suggests Some Whistleblowers ‘Will Be Appearing’ at Benghazi Hearing Next Week
Utah representative Jason Chaffetz suggested that whistleblowers with “personal, firsthand knowledge” of the 9/11 attacks in Benghazi will speak at a congressional hearing next week. Fox News’s Bill Hemmer pressed Chaffetz on whether these individuals would come out publicly for the first time at the recently announced hearing. “I think they will be appearing,” Chaffetz said, “some of them, some of them.”
Saudis’ Boston warning
Told US last year
Additional Arrests In Boston Marathon Bombing
Report: Charges Are For Aiding AFTER The Fact
Syrian military site hit by fresh Israeli strike early Sunday
Israeli official says target was an Iranian missile shipment; IDF declines to comment; rocket expert says Iranian Fatah-110 missiles would be ‘game-changer’ if they reached Hezbollah
National
Looters Target Homes Under Repair After Superstorm Sandy
Sounds like this give shore residents hope that their homes will be repaired and rebuilt by the summer season after Superstorm Sandy ripped through here.
6 Months After Sandy: Many Recovered, Thousands Still Homeless
Six months after Sandy ravaged the tri-state area, uprooting thousands of trees, decimating homes and submerging cities, many residents say life has mostly returned to normal, though for some, recovery from the deadly storm remains a painstaking process, and “life as normal” a far-away dream that may never be realized.
No One Wants to Buy Student Loan-backed Securities
Worried by reports of rising defaults, investors turned up their noses at a new $225 million bond issue by Sallie Mae, the federal agency that packages individual student loans into large securities. The loan company canceled the offering after two weeks on the market.
Gov. Cuomo tells associates he would skip 2016 presidential race if Hillary Clinton runs
Cuomo quietly ‘concedes’ 2016 race
Top GOP Donors Launch Push for Gay Marriage: ‘The Right Thing for the Country But Also Good Politics’
In the wake of the 2012 election, many Republican strategists have concluded they simply cannot win as long as they seem so “polarizing.” One of the more contentious issues is gay marriage, with those on the left often accusing Republicans of being intolerant. But now, a national group of prominent GOP donors is pouring new money into lobbying efforts to get Republican lawmakers to vote to make gay marriage legal.
Rand Paul, Hillary Clinton atop New Hampshire 2016 poll
Sen. Rand Paul is the frontrunner in a hypothetical New Hampshire GOP primary, though Hillary Clinton would beat him in a general election after scoring a landslide victory in a Democratic primary if she jumped in, a new poll says.
“Protect Pregnant Women, Not Criminals’”
That’s the message actress Margaret Colin — you may remember her from Independence Day — delivers in a new video.
Senator Durbin Defends Rallying with Communists and Anarchists
Swinging Colorado Back
“Colorado is no longer politically purple. Nope. These days it’s somewhere between Air Force and Midnight on the blue scale.”
Larry Flynt Endorses Mark Sanford — Because it Wasn’t all Weird Enough
Because things weren’t weird enough in the special election for South Carolina’s 1st District House seat, what with satirist Stephen Colbert’s sister taking on the world’s foremost Appalachian Trail hiker, now Hustler publisher Larry Flynt has entered the picture.
Irony: Daughter of Brutal Dictator to Receive Gay Rights Award in Philadelphia
Laughably, the so-called Equality Forum is giving an award to the daughter and niece of brutal dictator’s who offer zero rights to their own people. Talk about tone deaf. But it’s a gay award or something, and that’s all that matter these days.
Cruz 2016
The freshman senator is considering a run for president.
Baby’s Head Found Inside Patient of Michigan Abortionist
A Michigan abortionist whose clinic was shut down in 2012 faces allegations from a doctor who found a severed infant’s head inside the body of one of his patients.
Census Report Shocker
The issue of “who’s minding the kids” is now taking back seat to “who is having the kids.” The just-released Census Bureau Report, “Social and Economic Characteristics of Currently Unmarried Women With a Recent Birth, 2011,” (SECCUM) describes for the first time the demographic details of non-marital childbearing — and it is not a pretty picture.
Threat to divest city funds from a Koch-owned LA Times likely unconstitutional
Threats by members of the Los Angeles City Council to use the city’s pension funds to penalize investors if they sell the Los Angeles Times to Charles and David Koch could be illegal and unconstitutional, experts say.
Local NBC Reporter Hilariously Denies Soviet Flags Present At May Day Rally: ‘What Do They Represent?’
While covering a May Day rally in Manhattan’s Union Square on Wednesday, NBC New York reporter Ida Siegal was cornered and asked if her network planned to show the communist imagery the protesters were displaying. Hilarity ensued when Siegal immediately became defensive, denying she had seen any communist imagery and asking of the “Hammer-and-Sickle” flags: “What do they represent?”
Planned Parenthood Educational Material for Children
Some moonbattery is too tasteless even for the left-wing degenerates comprising the “mainstream” media — even if it is subsidized with our tax dollars and force-fed to 10-year-olds
New Lawsuits Shine a Light on Pregnancy Discrimination
Stephanie Stewart, an honors student at the Borough of Manhattan Community College on an academic scholarship, was due to deliver her son before the end of the spring semester in 2012. She needed some accommodations because she would not be able to attend every session of her women’s studies class. Stewart figured her professor would be understanding—it was a women’s studies class.
Economy
& Taxes
Spain Is Beyond Doomed: The 2 Scariest Unemployment Charts Ever
This is what a permanent underclass looks like.
Colorado lawmakers discussing marijuana-legalization repeal effort
A proposal that could lead to the repeal of marijuana legalization in Colorado has gained momentum at the state Capitol.
EU sees deeper euro zone recession in 2013, slower deficit cuts
The euro zone economy will contract by more than expected this year and budget deficits will decline more slowly, the European Commission said on Friday as it set out forecasts for the next two years.
Las Vegas Housing: 8% of Single Family Homes Vacant, Yet New Construction Permits Up 50%
If there is any market that demonstrates the complete and total misallocation of capital that results from Banana Ben Bernanke’s money printing and artificially low interest rate policy, it the latest phony American housing bubble.
International
35% of Mexican adults would migrate to the United States
Canadian Broadcasting Corp. Job Ad – “Any Race Except Caucasian”
“The ad calls for audition submissions for a male host between 23-35 years of age and not white for the “Kids’ CBC” programming block. Yahoo’s Matthew Coutts tweeted that the new host is to appear with CBC puppet “Mamma Yamma” and personality Patty Sullivan.”
CBC is hiring!
So does this also mean “no Irish” need apply?
Two Chinese kindergarten students die after rival school poisons yogurt
Chinese state media say two girls have died after eating poisoned yogurt placed outside their kindergarten at the direction of the head of a rival school.
China Crosses ‘Line Of Actual Control’ With Stealth Invasion Of India
Whether this is just a ‘misunderstanding’ or a land-grab to make up for Japan’s Senkaku actions, the Indians are claiming that a platoon of Chinese soldiers have crossed the so-called ‘Line of Actual Control’ in the Indian-held Ladakh region.
Rolling fistfight erupts in Venezuelan parliament over disputed election
Brawl erupts after opposition members are banned from speaking until they accept Nicolás Maduro as president
How Japan’s “Stealth Constitution” Destroys Civil Rights and Sets the Stage for Dictatorship
If there was ever a clear sign that the leadership of Japan is fully aware that the country is about enter a terminal economic catastrophe this is it. Using the cover of currency devaluation and a rising stock market, Japan’s Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, is attempting to make it easier to change the country’s constitution so that they can eliminate freedom of speech and set the stage for a military dictatorship.
Egypt’s Ticking Population Bomb
A rapidly rising population is not inherently a sign of trouble. But Egypt has clearly tumbled into a Malthusian trap. Once a major agricultural exporter, Egypt ranks now as the world’s largest importer of wheat. A surge in world wheat prices after 2006 lead to economic crisis in Egypt, where deeply subsidized bread has become a cherished social entitlement.
Local elections: Nigel Farage hails UKIP’s ‘remarkable’ results
UKIP leader Nigel Farage has hailed gains in council elections across England as “remarkable” for the party.
Brighton Council adopts new ‘MX’ title for its transgender population
‘Mx’, short for ‘Mixter’, is a gender neutral title
Council’s policy committee approved plan yesterday
Move follows report into services for trans people
The old order is dying. We are living in the age of Farage
If something can’t go on forever it won’t. This is the bitter lesson the Coalition has learned today, and will again next year at the European elections. Some of us have been predicting this for some time but I think even the most optimistic among us have been surprised by the suddenness of the change. In the space of half a year, Ukip have gone from being the party of the protest vote to the revolutionary force which threatens to transform the British political scene almost beyond recognition.
Opinion
Desegregation, before Brown
Barry Goldwater and the forgotten campaign in Phoenix
Billionaire Tom Steyer — the ‘Liberal Analogue of the Koch Brothers’ — Is the Latest Bloomberg or Buffett
The newest celebrity in the liberal universe is billionaire Tom Steyer. In a story headlined “The Wrath of a Green Billionaire,” Bloomberg Businesweek reporter Joshua Green explained he’s hailed as “a liberal analogue of the conservative Koch brothers, the billionaire owners of Koch Industries, whose lavish support of free-market causes and political ruthlessness loom large in the liberal imagination
Class warfare for Republicans
There’s nothing fundamentally unRepublican about class warfare. After all, the party – led by what was then called Radical Republicans – waged a very successful war against the old slave-holding aristocracy; there’s nothing to be ashamed of in that conquest. Republicans under Abraham Lincoln also pushed for greater landownership through such things as the Homestead Act, which supplied 160 acres of federal land to aspiring settlers.
GOP Finally Engages Mommy Blogs
Some make fun of the niche, but it’s an influential and driving force in marketing. The GOP has finally figured this out and engaged the mommy blog community, albeit ten-plus years after its explosion.
The Real Problems With Psychiatry
A psychotherapist contends that the DSM, psychiatry’s “bible” that defines all mental illness, is not scientific but a product of unscrupulous politics and bureaucracy.
How the Koch Boys Could Save American Higher Education
Charles and David Koch are reportedly interested in buying the Tribune Company’s eight newspapers, including The Los Angeles Times, The Chicago Tribune and The Baltimore Sun. According to The New York Times, this is less about making a profit than acquiring a platform to extol the brothers’ laissez-faire ideas. Current estimates put the price tag at about $623 million (privately owned Koch Industries have annual revenues of about $115 billion).
Nicholas Jackson, Ghastly Little Fascist
Today’s Ghastly Little Fascist award goes to one Nicholas Jackson, the “digital director of Pacific Standard.” This afternoon, Jackson, who “has also worked for The Atlantic, Encyclopaedia Britannica, Texas Monthly, Slate, and other publications, both online and in print” — and thus should presumably know better — took without irony to his new online home to argue against the free-speech rights of people he doesn’t like.
The Triumph of Suburbia
The “silver lining” in our five-years-and-running Great Recession, we’re told, is that Americans have finally taken heed of their betters and are finally rejecting the empty allure of suburban space and returning to the urban core.
NBC – “Charity is Bad”
Apparently, to the intellectual vapor-weights at NBC, Government Welfare is good, but private charity is bad. That is the only take-away I can get from this piece about the West, TX fertilizer plant explosion. You see, since Texas is a low tax, low spending, low regulation state, most of the victims of the blast are having to *gasp* rely on relatives, friends, and their community to get back on their feet.
‘Hate Crime’ Hoaxes
Why are they so common, especially on campus?
Winning Hispanic vote would not be enough for GOP
After six months of mulling over November’s election results, many Republicans remain convinced that the party’s only path to future victory is to improve the GOP’s appeal to Hispanic voters. But how many Hispanic voters do Republicans need to attract before the party can again win the White House?
“RINO” vs. “Moderate Republican”
In case you haven’t noticed, there is a battle going on, and I’m not talking about the “war on” poverty, drugs, illiteracy or terror. The conflict I’m talking about is taking place within the Republican Party. In the wake of Mitt Romney’s disappointing loss to arguably the worst President in U.S. history, “Constitutional Conservatives”, ”Social Conservatives”, “Fiscal Conservative/Social Liberals”, “Libertarians”, “Moderates” and “RINO’s” are all beating the hell out of each other…and they’re doing so in public forums, much to the amusement of the Democrats. I want to address the latter two factions for now, but I’ll discuss some o
Six months after Sandy ravaged the tri-state area, uprooting thousands of trees, decimating homes and submerging cities, many residents say life has mostly returned to normal, though for some, recovery from the deadly storm remains a painstaking process, and “life as normal” a far-away dream that may never be realized.f the others in future posts.
Hello, She Lied
In a better world, the horrible travails of the Duke lacrosse team would have led colleges and universities across the country to do more to protect young men from having their reputations destroyed and their lives ruined by false accusations of sexual misconduct.
Democracy’s Death-by-Welfare
Is our political regime fated to whither away? Are political regimes fated to decay and die away, as everything in nature is?
Waking the dragon — How Feinstein fiddled while America burned
Along with bombs and bombers, guns seem to be all the media wants to talk about these days. Death is sexy to our miscreant media, especially when people are killed on purpose. And when that happens, it’s all the newspapers and news stations will print and broadcast, in turn making these events appear worse than they are in reality.
Nudging Conservatives to Harness Behavioral Science
Filed under: Government & Politics, Big Ideas While liberals are deploying behavioral science with stunning results, conservatives have failed to follow up on their success three decades ago with the psychology of ‘broken windows.’ Here are several policy initiatives with which to begin.
Hyper-sexualized, asexual America
The FDA wants 15-year-old girls to get morning-after birth-control drugs over the counter, without the knowledge or consent of either parents or doctors. President Obama says he approves of this decision. But birth-control activists say it doesn’t go far enough. They want the requirement for teenage purchasers to show photo ID dropped, and they’d really like to see 11-year-old girls getting these pills.
